Minister: Africa must put energy poverty before the climate crisis

Equatorial Guinea’s Minister of Mines and Hydrocarbons, Gabriel Mbaga Obiang Lima, said Africa must solve its “energy poverty” problems before facing the challenges of the climate crisis.

“Africa first needs to tackle energy poverty before we can talk about the energy transition,” Lima said in a statement published today on social networks regarding his speech at the “MSGBC Oil, Gas & Power 2021” conference, which concluded on Friday. Dakar discussed energy on the continent.

“There is energy poverty. It is located in a large part of Africa. You cannot talk about the energy transition without first providing electricity to its people,” said the minister, whose country is one of the largest oil producers on the continent. Although it also contains large reserves of gas.

More than 500 million people lack access to electricity in sub-Saharan Africa, according to studies by international organizations such as the World Bank.

Thus, Lima appealed to Senegal, Mozambique and Uganda, “the new oil and gas producers in Africa, to speak out and defend their right to develop their resources, because they have the most to lose.”

said the head of mines and hydrocarbons, the son of the president of Equatorial Guinea, Teodoro Obiang, who has led the central African country in strength since 1979.

“The amount of energy used to play video games in the United States is equivalent to that used by the entire central Nigerian government. You can’t just blame the producers. Consumption and consumption habits must be addressed,” Lima added.

Under the theme “New Wave of Investment,” the “MSGBC Oil, Gas & Power 2021” conference last Thursday and Friday in Dakar analyzed ways to improve regional partnerships and stimulate investment and development opportunities in the oil, gas and energy sectors. Energy within the MSGBC Basin.

MSGBC brings together the countries of the common sedimentary basin in Mauritania, Senegal, The Gambia, Guinea-Bissau and Guinea Conakry, which remains untapped despite the potential it has revealed in recent years.