Key Takeaways

  • The DRC supplies 70% of the world's cobalt — and when it began processing cobalt domestically rather than exporting raw material, its cobalt export value leapt from $167 million to $6 billion: a 36x multiplier that is already documented, not projected
  • Africa holds over 40% of global lithium reserves, 80% of platinum group metals, and 60% of the world's uncultivated arable land — the continent is the irreplaceable physical foundation of the global energy transition
  • Global demand for critical minerals is projected to increase 5x by 2035 vs. 2023 levels as EV batteries, solar panels, and wind turbines scale globally​
  • Foreign investment in African mining rose 38% in 2025 to $32 billion — every major industrial power is racing to lock in African supply chain access before this decade's deficits materialize​
  • At the 2025 BRICS Rio summit, South African President Ramaphosa stated explicitly: "These minerals must not be exported in raw form only. There should be beneficiation and value addition on the continent." — backed by governments representing 40%+ of global GDP​
  • Africa attracted $13.84 billion in energy transition investment in 2025 across 306 transactions; the IEA projects the continent will need $200 billion annually by 2030
  • Zimbabwe is advancing a $450 million lithium refinery; Mali, Ghana, and Zimbabwe have mandated national equity stakes in all mining operations​
  • The beneficiation opportunity sits in refining, processing, battery components, and industrial energy supply — not extraction. That is where the 36x multiplier lives.

The Cobalt Mandate

The Democratic Republic of Congo supplies 70% of the world's cobalt.

For decades, that cobalt left the country in raw form — dug from the earth, loaded onto ships, and processed into battery-grade material in China, Japan, South Korea, and Europe.

The DRC received the commodity price. Everyone downstream received the value-added margin.

Then the DRC began processing cobalt domestically.

The country's cobalt export value went from $167 million to $6 billion.

That is a 36-times multiplier — not a future projection, but a realized outcome that already happened when one African nation decided its mineral wealth would stay in Africa long enough to generate industrial value.​

At the 2025 BRICS summit in Rio de Janeiro, the heads of state representing nations that account for more than 40% of global GDP made a collective declaration: this model must become the continent-wide standard.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa stated it in plain language:

"These minerals must not be exported in raw form only. There should be beneficiation and value addition on the continent."

The era of Africa as raw material supplier to the world's manufacturers is officially, institutionally, and irreversibly closing.​

The Number That Matters

5x — the projected increase in global demand for critical minerals by 2035 compared to 2023 levels.

Solar panels, wind turbines, EV batteries, energy storage systems, and advanced semiconductors all require dramatically higher mineral inputs than the fossil fuel infrastructure they are replacing.

That demand is not flexible.

It must be met.

And the supply is overwhelmingly in Africa.​

The Resource Position

Africa's critical mineral endowment is not a marginal factor in the global energy transition.