President Hage Geingob said his government will implement measures to ensure that the country’s natural resources – particularly newly found oil in the south of the country – benefit every citizen.
In his Independence address on Monday, Geingob said his government was making a conscious effort to avoid the resource curse – a situation where countries endowed with a rich source of natural resources struggle to make effective use of these and often end up with lower levels of economic development than countries with low levels of natural resources.
“The government is committed to ensuring that the development and exploitation of these resources will be transparent and benefit Namibia’s people and future generations,” he said
“Therefore, to avoid the infamous resource curse, the Government will soberly plan the distribution and utilisation of the benefits of these resources so that all Namibians participate in the country’s prosperity.”
The President noted that the enactment of policies such as the National Equitable Economic Empowerment Bill (NEEEB) is an absolute must, “as the Namibian Constitution enjoins us to enact laws and policies for the advancement of persons who have been economically disadvantaged by past discriminatory laws and practices.”
NEEEB, according to the government, seeks to promote the economic empowerment of previously disadvantaged Namibians.
The President added that Namibia needs to develop strategic policies that are aligned with future trends if it is to shield the domestic economy against future external shocks.
“There is no need for a new plan of action. Instead, there is an urgent need for efficient and effective execution across all sectors of our society to fast track our national developmental objectives. Our experience over several years has taught us valuable lessons. It has taught us that we must always expect the unexpected, we should be ready to withstand various shocks and that we need to develop the necessary resilience in our economy to sustain economic growth and produce employment opportunities,” Geingob said.
“Since 2015, Namibia has been adversely affected by independent intervening variables, such as the global commodity crisis, currency fluctuations and severe drought. When it looked like we were out of the woods, we were visited by an unwelcome guest – COVID-19.”
This comes as the government has been driving the green hydrogen initiative, a development expected to create 20 000 jobs and contribute US$6 billion in potential foreign direct investment. At its peak, the project is also expected to produce two million tonnes of ammonia, generate over N$800 million in revenue per annum, and house generation assets of 5 Gigawatt with the capability to produce power at less than 3 US cents per kilowatt.
Namibia is also expected to join the ranks of oil producers after Shell Namibia Upstream B.V and Qatar Energy, in partnership with the National Petroleum Company of Namibia (NAMCOR), recently announced that they discovered a working petroleum system for light oil in the Orange Basin, 270 km from the town of Oranjemund, where drilling operations commenced in early December 2021 and were safely completed in early February 2022.
NAMCOR’s other partners, TotalEnergies, alongside QatarEnergy, and Impact Oil and Gas have also announced the Venus-1X discovery
