The next great contest for Africa’s natural resources will increasingly revolve around the minerals powering electric vehicles, wind turbines, missiles, satellites, advanced electronics and other technologies.

Rare earth elements sit near the centre of that competition. Africa possesses significant undeveloped deposits, including sources of neodymium and praseodymium, essential for high-performance permanent magnets, and heavy rare earths such as dysprosium and terbium.

But possessing minerals is not the same as possessing mineral power. The strategic question is whether Africa will export another generation of raw materials or use the rare-earth boom to build processing, manufacturing and technological capabilities of its own.

Why rare earths have become strategic

Despite their name, rare earths are not necessarily geologically rare. Their strategic importance comes from the difficulty of finding commercially attractive deposits and, crucially, separating and refining them economically. China dominates this second stage.

The International Energy Agency estimates that China accounted for about 60 percent of global mined production of rare earth magnets in 2024, but around 91 percent of refining and 94 percent of sintered permanent-magnet manufacturing. This distinction is critical for Africa. Opening African mines does not automatically reduce global dependence on China if the resulting concentrates must still be exported for separation, refining and magnet production.

Rare-earth security has therefore moved beyond mining. It is becoming a question of industrial and national security.

Africa’s emerging rare-earth map

Several projects could transform Africa’s position. Malawi’s Kangankunde project contains significant neodymium-praseodymium mineralisation and is moving towards production. Malawi also hosts Songwe Hill, while Tanzania’s Ngualla project is another potentially important source of magnet rare earths.

Uganda’s Makuutu project is strategically different. Its ionic-adsorption clay mineralisation offers potential access to heavy rare earths important for advanced magnets capable of operating at high temperatures.

South Africa possesses projects including Steenkampskraal and Phalaborwa, while Madagascar also has substantial rare-earth potential. Angola’s Longonjo project demonstrates how mineral deposits are becoming connected with geopolitics and infrastructure. Its location near the railway linking Angola’s interior to the Atlantic through the Port of Lobito places it close to one of Africa’s most strategically important emerging transport corridors.

The future rare-earth economy will consequently be a competition over corridors as well as mines.

China starts with an enormous advantage

For Washington and Europe, Africa represents an opportunity to diversify supply chains. But China enters this competition with decades of accumulated advantages. It possesses processing technology, experienced engineers, enormous separation capacity and manufacturers capable of absorbing refined materials.

Western governments are responding with development finance, infrastructure investment and strategic mineral partnerships designed to create alternative supply chains. Africa, however, should avoid defining success simply as replacing Chinese buyers with Western buyers.

If African ore leaves the continent regardless of whether its destination is China, Europe or America, the underlying economic relationship remains largely unchanged. Africa remains the mine while somebody else owns the refinery, technology and magnet factory.

The real prize is beneficiation

This is why beneficiation should become the centre of African rare-earth strategy. The value chain progresses from mining and concentration through chemical processing and separation into individual rare-earth oxides before moving into metals, alloys and permanent magnets.

Each stage becomes more technologically demanding but potentially captures more economic value. The African Union’s Green Minerals Strategy recognises this challenge by emphasising value addition, industrialisation, skills and regional mineral value chains.

This represents an important change in thinking. Mineral policy must become industrial policy. African governments should use competition between foreign investors to negotiate infrastructure, technical training, local processing and participation by domestic companies rather than simply maximising royalties from ore exports.

Not every country needs a refinery

Beneficiation cannot simply become another political slogan.

Rare-earth separation is technologically demanding, expensive and potentially environmentally hazardous. Processing requires reliable electricity, water, specialised chemicals, skilled personnel, transportation and sophisticated waste management. It would make little economic sense for every African country containing rare-earth deposits to construct a complete mine-to-magnet industry.

Regional specialisation offers a better model. One country could produce concentrates, another host a regional separation facility, while a more industrialised economy manufactures alloys, magnets, motors or other components.

AfCFTA could provide the commercial framework connecting those stages. Africa should therefore think in terms of continental mineral ecosystems rather than isolated national mines.

Transport corridors such as Lobito become particularly important under this model. Railways should not merely carry minerals from mines directly to ships. They should connect deposits with African industrial zones, processing facilities, electricity networks and manufacturing centres.

The resource curse remains a danger

Rare earths nevertheless carry familiar risks. Poorly negotiated concessions could transfer most economic value abroad while leaving African governments with royalties and environmental liabilities. Communities surrounding deposits could suffer displacement or pollution without receiving durable economic benefits.

Rare-earth processing itself can involve hazardous chemicals and, depending on the geology, radioactive materials. The Western effort to diversify supply away from China should therefore not become an excuse for African governments to accept weak contracts or environmental standards.

Instead, geopolitical competition should increase African bargaining power. The principle should be straightforward: access to minerals in exchange for investment, infrastructure, technology, training and progressively greater local processing.

African governments could also face pressure to choose between Chinese and Western mineral ecosystems. That would unnecessarily reduce their strategic options. China will remain an enormous investor, processor and market. America and Europe want alternative supplies. Japan and South Korea possess advanced manufacturing capabilities, while India is seeking greater access to critical minerals.

Africa’s strongest position is therefore multi-alignment. Governments should encourage competing investors, diversify export markets, negotiate technology partnerships and prevent any single foreign power from dominating mineral infrastructure.

Competition between major powers should become leverage for African industrialisation rather than another mechanism for external control.

From mineral wealth to strategic power

Africa has experienced commodity booms before. Gold, diamonds, copper, cobalt and oil generated enormous exports without always producing comparable industrial transformation. Rare earths provide another opportunity—but also another risk of repeating the same economic model.

For BusinessDay readers, the strategic issue is therefore not simply how many tonnes of rare earths lie beneath African soil. The decisive questions are where those minerals are processed, who controls the technology, who finances the infrastructure and where the highest-value manufacturing occurs.

If Africa simply exports another generation of raw materials, the rare-earth revolution will reproduce an old economic relationship under a new green and technological label.

If African governments instead use today’s competition between China, America, Europe and other powers to build infrastructure, processing capacity, skills and regional manufacturing, the outcome could be very different.

Africa’s real strategic resource is not simply the rare earth beneath its soil. It is the continent’s ability to control more of the value chain after that mineral leaves the ground.