MINERAL RESOURCES, CLIMATE CHANGE AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT IN AFRICA: A NIGERIAN REGULATORY PERSPECTIVE

Abstract

This article examines the relationship between mineral resource governance, climate change and sustainable development in Africa through a focused Nigerian lens. It argues that Nigeria’s extractive economy, while central to public finance and industrial policy, has historically generated deep environmental harm, social conflict and weak accountability, particularly in oil producing regions and in under-regulated solid minerals operations. Adopting a doctrinal methodology, the paper analyses the international and African regional legal principles that condition resource extraction, including sustainable development, permanent sovereignty over natural resources, prevention of environmental harm, participation, remediation and intergenerational equity. It then evaluates Nigeria’s domestic legal architecture, with particular attention to the Climate Change Act 2021, the Petroleum Industry Act 2021 and the Nigerian Minerals and Mining Act 2007. The article contends that the Petroleum Industry Act 2021 represents a major institutional and fiscal reform, but that its environmental and host-community innovations remain insufficiently integrated with climate obligations and remain vulnerable to enforcement weakness. It further argues that the Mining Act 2007 contains considerably stronger express provisions on environmental impact assessment, rehabilitation and community development agreements, yet suffers from implementation deficits and limited monitoring capacity. Through analysis of leading caselaw authorities, the paper demonstrates that African environmental adjudication is increasingly rights based, participatory and remedial in orientation. It concludes that Nigeria requires more coherent integration of climate planning, extractive licensing, environmental compliance, host-community participation and remediation finance if resource exploitation is to become a genuine instrument of sustainable development rather than a recurring source of ecological loss and distributive injustice.