Thirty-eight of Africa’s 54 states are at the coast and two-thirds of Africa’s equivalent land mass lies in its maritime zones under the sea. More than 90% of the continent’s trade is conducted by sea.

This highlights the enormous opportunity presented by water in the continent’s future, delegates at African Development Week.

The statistics supported the case for the continent and countries to develop “blue economies” to support their quest for sustainable growth and economic transformation.

The continent not only benefits from an extensive coastline, it also has some of the biggest fresh water sources in the world. The Great Lakes in central Africa contain the largest proportion of the world’s surface fresh water – 27%, a statistic that makes it a globally strategic resource.

Lake Victoria is the third largest freshwater lake in the world. By volume and depth Lake Tanganyika is the third largest. These are all strategic assets for Africa that are underutilised but represent enormous opportunity to develop new economic activity and more sustainable development.

The inherent opportunities for African in this undeveloped area led the ECA to take the vision for a Blue Economy a step forward with a new publication, Africa’s Blue Economy: A policy handbook, which was launched on 2 April at African Development Week 2016.

Leading the discussion at the launch, ECA Executive Secretary Carlos Lopes thanked Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma for her role in initiating the project and putting the blue economy in the mainstream of Agenda 2063.

In the African Union’s 2050 Africa’s Integrated Maritime Strategy (AIM) the Blue Economy is described as the “new frontier of African Renaissance”.

The African Union has indicated that the blue economy could be a major contributor to an Africa wide shipping industry.

“We have a hidden treasure under our seas which needs to be revealed and help us to transform the continent,” said Dr Lopes, adding that two-thirds of Africa’s equivalent land mass lies under the sea and large areas of these waters were part of countries’ territorial waters.

Mauritius, for example, had territorial waters that were more than a thousand times the land mass equivalent of the island.

But Africa is still facing multi-faceted challenges preventing it from fully optimising Blue Economy assets.

For example, the size of water resources makes their access, sustainable use and management, as well as preservation and conservation, a daunting challenge for most African states.

Geopolitical issues are also a challenge. The increasingly intense use of the oceans and seas in several economic sectors, combined with the impacts of climate change, has added to the pressure on the marine environment.

Rapid urbanisation is leading to increased pressure on coasts and marine resources. Other threats include: piracy and armed robbery, trafficking of people, illicit narcotics and weapons, weather issues, rising sea levels and ocean acidification, illegal and unregulated fishing, pollution and habitat destruction.

Insufficient knowledge of resources as well as related rights and obligations for African states leads to capacity gaps. A number of maritime and transnational aquatic boundaries are not formally delimited. Insufficient awareness of the applicable legal frameworks and dispute resolution mechanisms and other related capacity gaps exacerbate the problem.

The uncertainty created by undemarcated borders can lead to tension between neighbouring countries. Additionally, this uncertainty may discourage investment and leave countries reticent to move forward with cooperation or joint development activities.

This article is published in the African Development Week Roundup - Day 4 by IC Publications.

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Foreword

Africa’s aquatic and marine spaces are an increasingly common topic of political discourse; its natural resources have remained largely underexploited but are now being recognized for their potential contribution to inclusive and sustainable development. This “Blue word” is more than just an economic space – it is part of Africa’s rich geographical, social, and cultural canvas.

Through a better understanding of the enormous opportunities emerging from investing and reinvesting in Africa’s aquatic and marine spaces, the balance can be tipped away from illegal harvesting, degradation, and depletion to a sustainable Blue development paradigm, serving Africa today and tomorrow. If fully exploited and well managed, Africa’s Blue Economy can constitute a major source of wealth and catapult the continent’s fortunes.

Africa’s economies continue to grow at remarkable rates, including through the exploitation of the rich endowment of land-based natural resources and commodity exports. Converting this growth into quality growth, through the generation of inclusive wealth, within environmental limits and respecting the highest social considerations, requires bold new thinking. It also involves the creation of jobs for a population on the rise.

The Blue Economy offers that opportunity. For example, the International Energy Agency estimates that ocean renewable energy has a power potential sufficient to provide up to 400% of global current energy demand. Other estimates indicate that in 2010 the total annual economic value of maritime related activities reached 1.5 trillion euro. It is forecasted that by 2020, this figure will reach 2.5 trillion euro per year. Surely, Africa needs holistic and coherent strategies to harness this potential.

All water bodies, including lakes, rivers, and underground water, in addition to seas and the coast are unique resources, yet neglected and often forgotten. The largest sectors of the current African aquatic and ocean-based economy are fisheries, aquaculture, tourism, transport, ports, coastal mining, and energy. Additionally, the Blue Economy approach emphasizes interconnectedness with other sectors, is responsive to emerging and frontier sectors, and supports important social considerations, such as gender mainstreaming, food and water security, poverty alleviation, wealth retention, and jobs creation. The Blue Economy can play a major role in Africa’s structural transformation.

The approach advocated in this Policy Handbook is premised in the sustainable use, management and conservation of aquatic and marine ecosystems and associated resources. It builds on principles of equity, low carbon footprint, resource efficiency, social inclusion and broad-based development, with the jobs agenda at the centre of it all. It is anchored on strong regional cooperation and integration, considers structural transformation as an imperative for Africa's development and advocates for a complete departure from enclave development models. Instead, through better linkages to other sectors of the economy, it situates the aquatic and marine economies as part of integrated ecosystem services based on the harvesting of living and non-living resources, benefitting both costal, island states and landlocked countries.

Biotic resources allow Africa to expand its fishing, aquaculture, mariculture sectors and foster the emergency of vibrant pharmaceutical, chemical and cosmetics industries. The extraction of mineral resources and the generation of new energy resources provide the feedstock to resource-based industrialisation and places Africa at the centre of global trade in value-added products, no longer a supplier of unprocessed raw materials. Central to this agenda, is the need to modernise Africa's maritime transport and logistics services, its port and railway infrastructure, improve its reliability and efficiency with the view to seamless link the continent's economies to national, regional and global value chains as well facilitate tourism and recreation activities, just to name a few.

Africa has salutary examples of maritime, riparian and river-based cooperation and dispute settlement. This includes examples of maritime and transnational aquatic boundary delimitation and demarcation. A collaborative approach for the development of the Blue Economy will create the foundation for the formulation of shared visions for transformation. The Blue Economy development approach is an integral part of African Agenda 2063. Building on the experience with implementing Green Economy principles for a transition to low-carbon development, we are seeing an increasing number of African member States formulating Blue Economy strategies to diversify their economic base and catalyze socioeconomic transformation.

This Policy Handbook, offers a step by step guide to help African member States to better mainstream the Blue Economy into their national development plans, strategies, policies and laws. It is a timely contribution to help the continent harness its “New Frontier”.