In a wide-ranging CEO conversation hosted by AFNIS Insights, AFNIS Founding Partner Suleiman Zakari and Abubakar Sadiq Omar mni, Managing Director and CEO of Steron Mining/Steron Energy, explored a question that goes beyond the technical language of geology, licences and commodities:
What happens when Africans begin to see their mineral resources not simply as things to be extracted, but as assets to be understood, preserved, valued and transformed?
The conversation offered a compelling answer: Africa’s resource challenge is not only about what lies underground. It is also about awareness, ownership, infrastructure, technical capacity, capital and the willingness to think beyond the next shipment.
The Value We Don’t See
Consider a house. A person sees walls, windows, cement, glass, tiles, electrical fittings and appliances.
A miner sees something different. Behind many of those products are minerals extracted from the earth, processed and transformed through long industrial value chains.
That distinction matters.
As the conversation developed, the participants argued that mining needs to become more relatable to the ordinary African by connecting the mineral to the product. Gypsum should not simply be thought of as something extracted from the ground. It is connected to the construction materials used to build homes.
The same logic extends across the economy.
- Minerals feed construction.
- They feed energy systems.
- They feed manufacturing.
- They feed electronics.
- They feed transportation.
- They feed modern technology.
Once that connection becomes visible, mining stops being an isolated extractive industry and starts to look like what it actually is: one of the foundational layers of modern life.
The conversation put the point in strikingly simple terms: almost everything in an ordinary room has a relationship with mining somewhere along its value chain. That recognition could fundamentally change how Africans think about resources.
Awareness Is Economic Power
For Zakari, awareness is not a communications exercise. It is part of economic strategy. If people do not understand the resources around them, they cannot fully understand the opportunities associated with those resources. And if a continent does not understand the value of what it produces, it becomes harder to negotiate from a position of strength.
The conversation therefore moved toward what might be called resource literacy.
Africa needs to know not only where its minerals are, but:
- what they contain;
- what they can become;
- who needs them;
- where they are currently being processed;
- what infrastructure is required to transform them;
- how they are priced;
- and where the greatest value is ultimately captured.
This is particularly important because an ore body rarely contains only one useful element. There is no perfectly “clean” copper ore or lithium ore.
Different minerals and elements can exist within the same geological system, and without adequate testing and processing capability, some of that potential can leave the continent without being fully understood or captured.
That creates an invisible form of value leakage. Africa may export more than it thinks it is exporting.
The Laboratory Is Part of the Mine
One of the most practical ideas to emerge from the discussion was the need for greater investment in testing laboratories and mineral analysis infrastructure. This may sound less glamorous than a mine, a refinery or a major processing plant, but it can be just as strategically important.
If a country cannot efficiently test, characterise and certify its mineral resources, it becomes harder to determine exactly what it has; and therefore harder to price, finance and develop those resources properly.
The conversation highlighted the potential for high-technology laboratories to serve as shared regional or continental infrastructure, rather than requiring every country or mining company to build identical capabilities independently.
That is a distinctly African opportunity. Instead of 54 countries trying to build 54 separate systems, strategically located facilities could serve multiple markets.
A laboratory, in this context, becomes more than a scientific facility.
It becomes part of the continent’s investment infrastructure.
- Better testing produces better information.
- Better information supports better project decisions.
- Better project decisions can improve investor confidence.
- And investor confidence can influence how capital flows.
The lesson is straightforward:
Resource sovereignty is built as much through knowledge infrastructure as through extraction infrastructure.
What Happens When Africa Stops Selling in a Hurry?
The conversation then reached one of its most consequential ideas: warehousing minerals.
The proposition is not that Africa should stop trading with the world. It is that Africa should have greater capacity to decide when, how and at what point in the value chain its resources are sold.
Zakari raised the idea of creating systems through which African producers could contribute a portion of their minerals to strategically managed warehouses. The concept would allow resources to be held rather than automatically sold immediately after extraction, potentially creating a collective pool of strategic commodities.
The significance becomes clearer when viewed collectively. One producer contributing a small amount may have limited influence. Hundreds or thousands of producers contributing systematically could create a very different asset base.
The conversation drew an analogy with gold and the potential value of retaining physical resources over time rather than immediately converting them into cash. The precise economics would depend on the commodity, storage costs, market conditions, financing arrangements and governance structure.
But the underlying principle is powerful:
Africa should explore mechanisms that give African producers greater control over the timing and conditions under which their resources enter global markets.
Africa Ships Its Minerals Out, But Where Are the Warehouses?
Then came an observation that cuts directly into the infrastructure of global commodity markets.
The participants discussed the absence of an LME-registered warehouse on the African continent, contrasting this with established warehousing infrastructure in Europe, Asia and elsewhere.
Whether considered from the perspective of logistics, commodity finance or market access, the broader question is difficult to ignore:
If Africa is a major source of minerals, why should so much of the infrastructure required to store, certify, trade and finance those minerals sit outside Africa?
This is bigger than warehousing. It raises questions about the architecture surrounding African commodities.
- Where are minerals stored?
- Where are they tested?
- Where are they certified?
- Where are they financed?
- Where are benchmark prices formed?
- Where do traders take ownership?
- Where do financial instruments develop around the physical commodity?
The mine may be in Africa, but much of the infrastructure surrounding the commodity can exist elsewhere. That is a strategic gap.
When You Sell Everything, You May Eventually Have to Buy It Back
There is another reason the warehousing discussion matters.
Minerals are finite. The participants returned repeatedly to this point.
If Africa extracts and exports its resources without simultaneously building reserves, processing capacity, industrial demand and strategic inventories, it eventually faces a peculiar possibility:
the resources it once owned may have to be purchased back from someone else.
The contradiction is particularly sharp for minerals expected to become increasingly important to energy and technology systems. Africa could supply the raw material today and then import the finished technology tomorrow.
That is why the conversation’s emphasis on local markets was so important. The objective is not merely to keep minerals underground.
It is to ensure that, while they are being extracted, African economies are also building the capacity to use them.
The Next Resource Frontier May Be Offshore
The conversation also looked beyond conventional terrestrial mining. Africa’s surrounding waters contain potentially significant resources and opportunities associated with the emerging field of deep-sea mining.
The participants argued that Africans need to understand these opportunities early rather than allowing another cycle in which external actors identify, develop and capture value from African resources before African institutions and companies are adequately positioned to participate.
But this frontier comes with an important qualification. Any development of marine mineral resources must contend with environmental questions, ecosystem impacts and the protection of marine life. The discussion itself recognised that technological capability would need to address these concerns.
The strategic lesson is therefore not simply “mine the ocean.”
It is:
Understand the opportunity before others define it for you, and develop the technical, regulatory and environmental capacity required to participate responsibly.
Africa’s New Commodity Moment
There is also a timing question.
The conversation noted strong demand for critical minerals associated with renewable energy and technological systems, alongside heightened interest in commodities such as gold.
That creates a window of opportunity. But windows close.
- Commodity markets change.
- Technologies change.
- Substitutes emerge.
- New deposits are developed.
- Recycling improves.
- Synthetic alternatives can reshape demand.
The discussion invoked the experience of diamonds and the way alternatives can alter the economics of natural resources. It also referenced Zimbabwe’s evolving lithium story as an example of how geological understanding can reveal opportunities that were not initially obvious.
The implication is important. Having the mineral is not enough. A country must understand the market, understand the technology, understand its resource base and develop the capacity to move quickly when an opportunity emerges.
The African Consumer Should Be Part of the Mining Conversation
Perhaps the most relatable part of the entire discussion came when the conversation returned to ordinary life.
- What does mining mean to an African trying to build a home?
- What does it mean to someone purchasing a phone?
- What does it mean to someone seeking electricity, transport or affordable infrastructure?
These are not abstract questions. They are everyday economic questions.
The discussion suggested that Africans need to begin connecting the minerals beneath the ground with the products above it. This changes the narrative.
- Mining is no longer just about miners.
- It is about builders.
- Manufacturers.
- Engineers.
- Technology companies.
- Energy developers.
- Banks.
- Investors.
- Entrepreneurs.
- Consumers.
- Young Africans looking for jobs.
- Communities looking for infrastructure.
- Governments looking for industrial growth.
The mining sector sits underneath all of them.
From Consumers of Narrative to Owners of Narrative
One of the CEO conversation’s most interesting analogies came from outside mining.
The anchor, Patrick Mulindwa, pointed to the evolution of African influence in global culture, particularly music, as an example of how the continent has moved from simply consuming external narratives to increasingly shaping the global narrative itself.
The suggestion was that mining needs a similar transformation. For decades, Africa has often been described through the lens of what it possesses:
Africa is rich in minerals. But possession alone is not power.
The more important questions are:
- Who develops them?
- Who finances them?
- Who processes them?
- Who sets the terms?
- Who owns the infrastructure?
- Who builds the industries around them? and ultimately:
- Who captures the value?
This is where the CEO conversation’s broader “One Africa, One Resource Vision” becomes relevant. The objective is not simply to tell a better story about African minerals. It is to build the economic systems that allow Africans to participate more deeply in the story.
The AFA–Steron Partnership: Turning the Vision Into Capital
The conversation also provided a concrete example of this philosophy moving from discussion to implementation. The Africans for Africa (AFA) Initiative and Steron Mining had entered into an MOU focused on the Wasa project.
Zakari explained that AFA, introduced at AFNIS 2024, had spent the subsequent period building toward operationalisation and was approaching its first US$100 million close for Mining Fund I. A key requirement for such a fund is a credible pipeline of projects capable of delivering returns to investors.
Steron’s Wasa project emerged from that process.
The two sides had already been discussing lithium, copper and rare earth opportunities, but a visit to the Wasa project helped accelerate the relationship.
The principle was strikingly practical: Seeing the project changed the conversation.
The visit gave AFA an opportunity to assess the work that had already been done and the vision behind the project before committing to a deeper relationship.
The stated ambition was for Wasa to become AFA’s first Nigerian investment, with the parties targeting a credible development milestone within six months of the MOU signing. This is the point at which the broader resource conversation becomes tangible.
- Capital meets project.
- Vision meets execution.
- African investors meet African assets.
- And a resource-development philosophy begins to acquire a financial mechanism.
The Hard Truth: This Is Not a Get-Rich-Quick Industry
Omar’s closing message was perhaps the most important corrective to the excitement surrounding Africa’s current resource moment.
Mining can be glamorous from a distance.
- A major discovery.
- A large investment.
- A strategic mineral.
- A headline valuation.
- A new processing plant.
But behind all of that lies years of work. The sector, he noted, has also been associated with periods of disorder, conflict and intense but sometimes short-lived success.
His warning was direct: Do not be distracted by the glitz.
- Resource development is legacy work.
- It requires patience.
- It requires technical discipline.
- It requires relationships.
- It requires capital.
- It requires infrastructure.
- And it requires thinking beyond the generation doing the mining today.
The mineral extracted today belongs to an economic story that may continue long after today’s executives have left the industry.
The Time Is Now, but the Work Is Long
The conversation ultimately returned to the idea of timing. For the participants, Africa is entering a moment in which global demand is creating greater interest in resources located on the continent.
That creates an opportunity for more balanced negotiations and greater participation in the global resource economy. But opportunity does not automatically become leverage.
- Leverage has to be built.
- It is built through knowledge.
- Through capital.
- Through infrastructure.
- Through laboratories.
- Through storage.
- Through processing.
- Through indigenous companies.
- Through regional cooperation.
- Through strong institutions.
- And through Africans understanding that the mineral beneath their feet is connected to the life they live above it.
That may be the most important shift of all. Africa does not need to convince itself that it is rich in resources. It needs to understand what that richness means, and build the capacity to turn it into lasting value.
The One Africa, One Resource Vision is ultimately a proposition about that transition.
- From extraction to value.
- From possession to ownership.
- From raw materials to industry.
- From consumers of resources to participants in resource markets.
And, perhaps most importantly, from simply being described by what Africa has to deciding what Africa does with what it has.
The time is now. But the work belongs to generations.