In countries around the world, from Ecuador to Nigeria, Global Greengrants Fund is working to support community-based groups in their efforts to resist the negative socio-environmental impacts of extractive industries. This year, Greengrants helped to support a meeting of grassroots groups from around the world, as well as organizations and individuals from across Africa, seeking to strategize ways to defend themselves against the spread of Big Oil into new parts of the continent. As a result of the meeting, which took place in Durban, South Africa, Greengrants’ Southern Africa Advisory Board is making energy and the industry’s imminent expansion in the region a key part of their grantmaking strategy in 2009.
When oil exploration began in 1958, communities and governments of West Africa thought oil would be a blessing—that it would bring their countries out of poverty and into an age of modernity. The reality has differed greatly from this hope. Instead, oil has brought environmental degradation, conflict, broken promises, increased poverty, and corruption. The curse of oil in West Africa was in great part due to the lack of strong political and civil society institutions at the time of Big Oil’s arrival. Since then, much has been learned, and organizations and networks have formed to combat the negative impacts of the oil industry. For example, the Host Communities Network, formed in the Niger Delta, is a network of communities affected by extractive industries that have come together and used their combined social capital to influence decision making at the national and international level. The original group was founded with eight member communities and has expanded, with the help of Greengrants, to now represent more than 35 communities. Had networks such as this existed 50 years ago, when oil exploration began, oil may not have been such a curse for West Africa. Oil may have been the opportunity communities had once hoped for.
With the increasing global demand for oil, companies have taken an interest in exploiting the recently discovered deposits of oil and natural gas in East and Southern Africa. Exploration has uncovered both subterranean and offshore deposits in several countries in the region, and many are believed to be sizable. Scientists predict that there could be as many as 40 billion barrels of oil beneath Ethiopia and Somalia. Also, deposits have been found around Lake Tanganyika in Tanzania, an area with a population greater than 300,000. While the prospect of oil development on such large scales is lauded by industry as a tremendous opportunity for economic and social development in these countries, community leaders and activists on the ground know that such discoveries call for a coordinated effort to ensure that community interests and rights are protected.
This year, Greengrants supported a meeting aimed at laying the groundwork for a strategic, community-based response to the anticipated expansion of oil development across the continent. The meeting brought organizations from oil-affected areas in West Africa, Ecuador, and Norway together with groups and individuals from East and Southern Africa to discuss the oil industry’s potential negative socio-economic impacts and to strategize ways that civil society in East and Southern Africa can prepare for Big Oil’s arrival. Participants included indigenous community leaders, legal activists from the Niger Delta, and members of civil society organizations, as well as women, farmers, and fisherfolk whose livelihoods are threatened by on-the-ground impacts of oil development. Several of Greengrants’ grantees and advisors also attended the meeting. In a sense, the meeting was meant to foster a kind of “proactive activism,” in which groups from East and Southern Africa could come together to form a unified front and to learn from veterans who have grappled with the oil industry’s destructive effects.
The Southern Africa Advisory Board has decided to capitalize on the momentum and energy ignited by this meeting. In 2009, the Board will dedicate 60 percent of its grantmaking budget to energy issues. Specifically, the Board seeks to support groups that attended the oil meeting so that they can take further action to ensure corporate and government accountability. The grants will focus on building the capacity of civil society organizations and connecting like-minded groups from different countries and regions to make certain that, collectively, local voices are heard by decision makers. Additionally, grants will focus on supporting groups that are able to strengthen governments themselves and ensure that policies addressing extractive industries will consider both communities’ rights and their environments.
With strong, connected political and civil society institutions, oil may not turn out to be the curse in Eastern and Southern Africa that it has been in the West. Instead, oil may be capitalized upon as an opportunity for the region. Either way, as a result of the oil meeting, along with support from Greengrants’ Southern Africa Advisory Board, communities in the area will be better prepared for the future impacts of Big Oil.