This article outlines a vision for Africa in 2050 in which the continent narrows the gap in per capita income and development outcomes that it has with middle-and high-income countries. Specifically, this article describes the challenges of building on Africa's endowment of natural resources to become a supplier of intermediate and finished goods and agricultural products, with a diversified private sector, a growing service sector, and a high degree of economic integration on the continent and in the world. First, the article outlines Africa's resource endowment. Africa has a fairly modest global reserve position, with the exception of gemstones, titanium, and bauxite. Second, the article evaluates African countries' track record in terms of extraction and processing, including a classification of countries according to their reliance on resource rents. Next, the authors present a vision for Africa's extractive industries that has the ultimate goal of macroeconomic stability. The article suggests that stabilization/ liquidity funds and wealth funds contribute to an increase in the quality of public investment and monetary policy. Finally, the authors suggest that African governments should encourage the growth of an ecosystem of supportive industries around the natural resource sector to increase the number of positive spinoffs from the extractive industries.
This paper is adapted from a speech given by James Bond at the International Energy Agency, 14 May 1998. The views expressed in this paper are those of the authors and should not be attributed in any manner to the World Bank, to its affiliated organisations, or to members of its board of executive directors or the countries they represent.The long-term price of oil should rest near its long run marginal cost (LRh4C). Past price history and both demand and natural supply factors suggest that an oil price in the low teens is closer to the LRh4C than the prices experienced over most of the last 25 years. For oil producing countries, this low price might not be as damaging as is often supposed -and might indeed encourage higher long-term growth. For oil consumers, low prices offer the opportunity to reform markets and reduce subsidies, with positive impacts on electricity rollout, development and the environment. For oil companies, low prices suggest the need to create new profit opportunities, but some of the more flexible and competitive players have already begun to show that this is possible.
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