Africa's Strategic Move to Secure Energy Sovereignty & Leadership in Superfood Supply
Africa's Strategic Move to Secure Energy Sovereignty & Leadership in Superfood Supply
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This episode explores the powerful convergence between South Africa’s strategic energy policy and Zimbabwe’s pursuit of nutritional sovereignty through indigenous plants—two pillars shaping Africa’s ambitious, self-defined future.
For decades, the global discourse on Africa's energy trajectory has been dominated by calls for a just transition away from fossil fuels—a framework often shaped by external voices. This raises a crucial question: What does a truly equitable transition look like? One that delivers the substantial, reliable energy base required to drive industrialization, support economic growth, and secure Africa’s competitive position on the global stage.
To unpack this, Pan-African Frequency spoke with Elias Monage, President of the Black Business Council and member of the BRICS Business Council, following South Africa’s recent decision to revive its nuclear power program. He reframes the country’s nuclear strategy not as a step backward, but as a deliberate and forward-looking investment.
“I don't think that it will be fair for the West or anyone to think that just transition means we need to transit from dark to another darkness. Just transition, it basically means we need to move with the right pace as a country so that we re industrialize, we then do things proper in terms of utilizing the resources that we have. I mean, Germany and various other countries that are saying we need to move faster on just transition, but they want to take our coal. And again that's the irony of the whole thing. So, we have abundance of coal, we need to use it for re-industrialization for the area, for the country, for the region and for the continent [...] And now we cannot fold our arms because energy becomes one of the tools that some of the countries that are using energy as a weapon to deal with the question of diplomacy. And that's the reason why for the continent, we're saying we need to have a convergence and alignment and complementarity so that we don't lose the energy efficiency and the ability of the continent to move ahead and re-industrialize the continent, and particularly at the back of Africa Continental Free Trade Area,” Monage highlighted.
Meanwhile, in Zimbabwe, the focus is on leveraging indigenous knowledge and resources for nutritional and economic sovereignty. Jacqueline Nyathi, Regional Manager at ZimTrade, explains how superfoods like Baobab and Moringa are being positioned as strategic assets, using the African Continental Free Trade Area as a launchpad to feed the continent first, turning heritage into health and wealth.
“For Zimbabwe, we have realized that it's quite critical for us to take advantage of our heritage-based products. You'll find that, not just in terms of exporting, but in terms of the nutritional values for the community, for the economy [...] Baobab and Moringa are highly promoted, but we also do have other indigenous plants.[....] You'll notice that there's been quite a lot of talk in recent years on how we can move from being commodity suppliers to value added so that we keep the revenue, the income within Africa. And as Zimbabwe, we also, through our national trade strategy, our industrial development policies, we say it's critical to ensure that we capacitate the producers so that what they are exporting are value-added products that will feature higher prices on the global market,” Nyathi explained.
This episode also features:
Yamb Ntimba, Cameroon, political philosopher and the founder of the Kheper think tank
Tune in to listen to the full conversation with our guests on the Pan African Frequency podcast, brought to you by Sputnik Africa.
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