As COP28 draws near, Aisse Feldheim and Emilinah Namaganda reflect on how Mozambique – which holds the third largest natural gas reserves in Africa – negotiated its interests at COP27 in Egypt last year. There is ever-growing controversy at the COP meetings around the role of natural gas in the global energy transition. While some pre-existing alliances were fracturing, Mozambique has forged new alliances in its pursuit for continued extraction of natural gas.
By Aisse Feldheim and Emilinah Namaganda
The annual United Nations Conference of Parties on Climate Change (COP) is the leading global forum for multilateral discussion of the climate change problem and potential solutions. At the twenty-seventh COP which was held in November 2022 in Sharm el-Sheik in Egypt, the role of natural gas in the global energy transition was one of the key issues discussed. Various scholars, non-government organisations, and some governments asserted that an urgent transition from fossil fuels, like natural gas, to renewable energy sources is critical for countries to mitigate climate change and its consequences. However, gas-rich African countries like Mozambique which also grapple with energy poverty and limited industrialisation were ambivalent about a rapid transition. In this blogpost, we use the case of Mozambique to explore how these gas-rich countries are negotiating their multifaceted interests to tackle energy poverty, advance industrialisation, and respond to climate change mitigation and adaptation.
Mozambique’s complicated interest in gas
Between 2010 and 2013, massive volumes of natural gas, amounting more than 180 trillion cubic feet were discovered in Mozambique. The country, located in the south eastern part of Africa, grapples with broadscale energy poverty, low levels of industrialisation, and low national income. To illustrate, only 20 per cent of the population in Cabo Delgado, the north eastern province where the gas reserves are located, has access to electricity. Hence, both the government and the citizenry anticipated the massive gas discoveries to alleviate the limited access to clean energy in Cabo Delgado, and other existing socio-economic challenges in the province and Mozambique at large. Indeed, in the years following the discoveries in Cabo Delgado, the granting of gas extraction licenses and the implementation of capital gains taxes increased government revenue. The government announced plans to invest this income in long-term economic diversification and enhanced provision of public services. In fact, it used the Mozambique gas development project to showcase its progress towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.
However, Mozambique’s vision of gas-fuelled development has been complicated by the vested interests of some national elites who seek to secure private and political benefits from the gas revenue windfalls. According to José Jaime Macuane‘s analysis, the historical and current distribution of power within the country’s political system is contingent upon access to financial resources among competing ruling factions. As a result, Macuane suggests that the ruling political party FRELIMO (Mozambique Liberation Front) is inclined to prioritize short-term economic gains from gas extraction projects over long term economic development. This can be observed, for example, in the favourable contractual conditions – such as exemptions from tax payments – which are granted to the consortia of multinational corporations which are developing the gas project (including Total, ENI, and ExxonMobil).
Furthermore, in Cabo Delgado, natural gas has not yet facilitated transformative change. First, the liquefied natural gas (LNG) is principally developed for export with limited linkages to the local economy. Second, construction of onshore LNG infrastructure has been accompanied by a contested displacement process in which over 10.000 people lost their homes and livelihoods. Scholars argue that the recent insurrection in Cabo Delgado, which by October 2022 had led to approximately 4000 deaths and more than one million people displaced, was partly fuelled by population discontent over the distribution of actual and potential benefits from natural gas and other resource extraction in the province. In March 2021, a combination of the insurrection and the Covid-19 pandemic led to suspension of onshore gas development. Hence, the socio-economic and political implications of gas development complicate Mozambique’s interest to extract the resource.
Another issue which complicates gas development in the country are the impacts and the solutions to the climate emergency. In terms of fatalities and economic losses from climate change-related impacts, Mozambique is among the most severely affected countries. In 2019, the devastating cyclones Idai and Kenneth resulted in the deaths of more than 700 people and the destruction of 240,000 houses across the country. Mozambique is expected to face increased extreme weather events such as cyclones, floods, droughts, and more frequent heatwaves in the future under business-as-usual scenarios where global fossil fuel combustion continues unmitigated. For this reason, despite meagre contribution to the climate change problem, some national and foreign activists propose that the country should not contribute to continued fossil fuel development by extracting its gas resources. Such debates worldwide around an urgent energy transition may also make it challenging for the country to attract and maintain financing for its gas development projects.
In sum, the interest to tackle energy poverty, advance industrialisation, and respond to climate change mitigation and adaptation make gas development in Mozambique a complicated endeavour, a predicament shared with other gas-rich African countries such as Nigeria. Hence, during COP27, the promotion of gas-fuelled development by Mozambique and other African governments emerged as a prominent theme.
Extraction of Fossil fuels
Mozambique participated at COP27 with 115 delegates led by president Filipe Nyusi. The country’s dual interests to extract natural gas for its socio-economic and political needs, but also to adapt to the changing climate and related impacts, were evident in some of the key negotiation groups through which its interests were articulated at the conference. The Group of 77 (G77) plus China and the African Group of Negotiators (AGN) are insightful examples.
Mozambique is a member of the G77+China which now comprises 135 members and is the largest coalition in climate change negotiations. The group was founded in 1964 and includes almost all low- and middle-income countries, plus China. Member states like Mozambique and subgroups, such as the Arab nations, advocate for a different configuration of the energy transition in the developing world, which constitutes further utilisation of fossil fuels for economic development in the short to medium-term. This argument is based on the principle of “Common but Differentiated Responsibility” (CBDR) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). The principle states that countries’ mitigation efforts should reflect their different responsibilities for greenhouse gas emissions and their varying economic capabilities to reduce them. It remains relevant to understanding the political position of the Mozambican government and other fossil fuel-rich African nations to continue utilising fossil fuels for their development, given their historically and currently low contribution to greenhouse gas emissions and their limited financial capacity to invest in mitigation efforts.
During the conference, at a plenary session titled “Mozambique in the Driving Seat of Southern Africa Energy Transition”, the Mozambican president and the president of the African Development Bank (AFDB) asserted the vital role of natural gas in Africa’s energy transition. The AfDB and the African Union (AU) generally supported the position of Mozambique and other fossil fuel-rich African countries to utilise their resources for economic development. Shortly before COP27, the AU published a “Common Position on Energy Access and Just Energy Transition”. The body emphasised the goal to utilise both “renewable and non-renewable energy” resources to address the persistent energy poverty and socio-economic challenges on the continent. In brief, backed by these continental African bodies, Mozambique’s position on natural gas exploitation echoed that of some G77+China sub-groups like the Arab States.
However, there were other sub-groups such as the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS), specifically members like Vanuatu and Tuvalu, which argued against continued gas development through other alliances such as the “Beyond Oil and Gas Alliance“. These countries contended that continued gas development would lock many countries in a high carbon pathway, exacerbating global climate change. Therefore, the G77 did not articulate a common position on the energy transition or the extraction of natural gas. This is not surprising considering the vast and heterogenous character of the negotiation group. Even the Group of African Negotiators (AGN) did not adopt continued gas development as their negotiation stance.
Although continental African bodies such as the AfDB and the AU can contribute to the discussions at the COP, they participate as observer organisations. The shared position of African countries in climate change negotiations is articulated by the AGN, which was established in 1995, and is a sub-group of the G77+China. The AGN focused on negotiations around adaptation and climate finance as a less controversial and potentially more successful stance for COP27. This stance aligned with the more-shared interest within the G77+China to demand for financing from industrialised countries which have historically contributed the most to greenhouse gas emissions, to support low-income countries which are now most vulnerable to climate change-related hazards (see related discussions on the loss and damage fund). Considering the AGN’s position together with that of Mozambique and the AU on natural gas clarifies the predicament of fossil fuel-rich African countries to balance their development ambitions with climate change adaptation and mitigation initiatives. Indeed, although promoting the role of natural gas for development was a visible COP27 objective for Mozambique, president Nyusi also underscored the “search for funding for climate and energy innovation agendas” as a critical goal for his government at the conference. Hence, Mozambique utilised established, albeit fractured, alliances such as the G77+China and the AGN to bargain for its multifaceted interests to tackle energy poverty, pursue economic development, and adapt to climate change. The country also sought new alliances to further these interests, particularly the more contested one of continued natural gas exploitation.
Natural gas as a global bridge fuel
One of Mozambique’s new alliances to further gas extraction is the “Gas Exporting Countries Forum” (GECF), which the country joined in 2022. Founded in 2001, GECF constitutes large gas-producing countries worldwide, such as Russia and Qatar, and advocates for the continued importance of natural gas for sustainable development. Before COP27, the group postulated natural gas as the “perfect solution” for achieving the triple goals of energy security, affordability, and sustainability. The GECF is not directly involved in the COP. However, the group identifies the COP as a “great opportunity to make a case for gas in the energy transition”, and its members have voiced this position in the conference for many years. For instance, many Arab states which promote further use of fossil fuels in developing nations are also members of the GECF. What makes this alliance particularly relevant at the previous and forthcoming COP28 is the overlap between the COP presidency and its members; Egypt (COP27) and the United Arab Emirates (COP 28). This overlap makes the pro-gas position more salient, albeit with matching contestation.
Moreover, following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and Europe’s search for new gas suppliers, natural gas in and beyond the GECF countries has attracted broader interest from governments worldwide and less opposition at the COP. The first shipment of LNG from Mozambique’s Eni-operated offshore gas fields set course for Europe during the final discussion in Sharm el Sheikh. Furthermore, a range of bilateral and private investment agreements for natural gas extraction in African countries like Egypt and Tanzania, for export to international markets were also made during the conference. In the end, the final resolution of COP27 focused on the phase out of coal energy and did not mention other fossil fuels, like natural gas. Rather, unclearly defined “low-emission energy” was proposed as the way forward, a vagueness which is open to further utilisation of gas. Therefore, gas-rich countries like Mozambique may be able to forge new alliances to facilitate their exploitation of the resource.
Turning the gaze to COP 28
Despite the omnipresent impacts of the climate crisis and the growing opposition to continued fossil fuel extraction by environmental advocates, the need for electrification and industrialization remains critical in resource-rich African nations, setting the stage for fierce debates at the COP28 on the role of natural gas in the energy transition. The persistence of the Russia-Ukraine war and Europe’s search for alternative sources of natural gas also implies that fossil fuel-poor countries may also be torn on the question of continued natural gas extraction. Gas development in Africa remains subjugated to worldwide energy needs, hence these geopolitical dynamics significantly influence development of the resource on the continent. Among actors from gas-rich African countries like Mozambique, the contradiction between the export-oriented nature of gas extraction, led by multinational corporations and national elites, and the socio-economic realities in producing areas such as Cabo Delgado will continue to be a source of divided opinions.
Given the fact that COP28 will be held in another GECF country and will be headed by a former employee of the natural gas sector, the relevance of gas as a bridge fuel for the global energy transition will remain central to the COP discussion. Therefore, it remains important to keep track of how negotiating groups such as the G77+China will position themselves on this matter, considering the increasingly diverging positions of their member countries in this regard. A key question is: along what lines might new alliances form? And what will be the social, economic, political, and environmental implications of pre-existing and new alliances for natural gas development in fossil-fuel rich African countries like Mozambique?
Climate policy and fossil fuel-rich African nations
By examining the case of Mozambique, this blogpost reflected on the complex aspirations that surround the extraction of natural gas from Africa amid the climate crisis. On one hand, gas-rich African countries seek to utilise the resource to address persisting energy poverty, low industrialisation, and other socio-economic challenges on the continent. However, existing cases of natural gas development in Mozambique and other African countries have not contributed significantly to such aims. Gas development has rather been focused on exports, with massive benefits to the extracting multinationals and some national elites, and less benefits to national economies and the communities in the resource-rich areas like Cabo Delgado. In the backdrop of these political-economic dynamics, it is unlikely that future (or continued) development of the resource will substantially improve the socio-economic situations in the countries and especially in the resource-bearing regions. Therefore, within the gas-rich countries, governments will need to convince the civil society – some of whom are increasingly contesting gas development – that different socio-economic outcomes can be envisioned.
On the other hand, gas-rich African countries like Mozambique are especially vulnerable to climate change-related hazards and seek to contribute to climate change adaptation and mitigation. Therefore, the countries are keen to attract finance for relevant initiatives such as the construction of resilient infrastructure in the communities which are prone to cyclones. As a result, during their engagements in climate policy forums like the COPs, the countries seek to balance their multifaceted interests to pursue natural gas exploitation and to respond to the climate change problem. By reflecting on some of the pre-existing (e.g., the G77+China and the AGN) and new (e.g., the GECF) alliances through which Mozambique articulated its interests at COP27, we see the complexity facing fossil-fuel rich African countries to navigate economic development, political interests, and global decarbonization ambitions.
Aisse Feldheim is pursuing his Master’s in Sustainable Development, with a focus on International Development Studies, at Utrecht University. As a research assistant for the InFront-project, he delves into the complex interconnections between the burgeoning natural gas frontier in Cabo Delgado and global climate governance.
Emilinah Namaganda is a PhD Candidate in the International Development Studies group of the Department of Human Geography and Spatial Planning at Utrecht University in the Netherlands. She researches on the socio-economic, environmental, and governance implications of an expanding frontier of energy transition-related resource extractivism in Mozambique.
Featured photograph: President Filipe Nyusi and AfDB president, Akinwumi Adesina, at COP27 on Mozambique’s role in the Southern Africa Energy Transition.
