From Fred Duodu, Dar Es Salaam (freduoo@gmail.com)
African countries have been urged to make sufficient investments in mastering their negotiation skills to make the best of their natural resources, particularly Extractives like oil, gas and mining.
George Lugalambi of Natural Resource Governance Institute (NRGI) who made the remark noted that the extraction industry is one of the most complicated and costly, hence the slightest sloppiness will mean a perpetual and irreversible lose.
He gave the advice in Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania during a training workshop for 24 journalists from East and West Africa this week. The training is sponsored by NRGI and managed in partnership with Penplusbytes of Ghana, the Journalists Environmental Association of Tanzania (JET) and the African Center for Media Excellence (ACME) of Uganda.
Natural resources have been a huge source of revenue for many countries for centuries now. For some, these resources has brought them huge revenues that have in turn transformed their economies and facilitated sustainable development. The United Kingdom, United Arab Emirates, Norway, Brazil among others are testimonies to these benefits.
Some have however lost out on the revenue and development that comes with it in very huge ways. Developing countries like Nigeria and Ghana despite being major players in the oil and mining industry respectively for decades are to have appreciable benefits from their resources.
This brings to the fore how some countries got it right with their natural resources and why others did not.
Mr Luglambi believes that the element of negotiating is what separates two category of nations.
He explained that making a good deal in negotiation is a determinant of what the country owning the resource will get today and in the future.
This he said involves making the right decision at the right time which is guided by what he referred to as the Natural Resource Decision Chain.
The decision chain illustrates the process of converting the discovery, exploration and production of natural resources into long-term sustainable development benefits instead of the current loses developing African countries incur in such deals.
The chain involves the process of deciding when to extract or not to, having the expertise to ensure a good deal through negotiations, ability to manage revenue and investing for sustainable development.
Kwame Ahiabenu of Penplusbytes, Ghana further added that succeeding in the decision chain is dependent on the Domestic Foundations for Recourse Governance in the local country such as having adequate information on the natural resources through research, analysis and investigations as well as a development plan, environmental considerations, well equipped and strong institutions and economic aspirations of the local country among others.
This must be done considering International Foundations for Resource Governance which looks at being conversant with International laws, best practices, expertise, the roles of multinational companies and international organisation and what they have to offer the local country.
NRGI and other organizations use the Natural Resource Charter to describe good governance along the decision chain. This is however different from Industry Value Chain which is how activities are organized in the industry from the upstream through the midstream to the downstream.
The Journalists drawn from Ghana are from Daily Guide, Ghana Broadcasting Corporation, Ghana News Agency, Adom Fm, TV3, Deutsche Welle TV, Viasat 1 TV and Business and Financial Times.
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