Africa holds billions of barrels of oil, billions of cubic meters of gas and produces most of the cobalt and manganese for electric car batteries.
This week, energy ministers, investors and oil sector executives are gathering in Cape Town for Africa Energy Week, which runs until October 16. The conference focuses on oil and gas investment, energy financing and ending energy poverty.
In this visual explainer, Al Jazeera maps where Africa’s essential oil, gas and minerals are found, how its electricity is produced and who is still missing it.
How much oil does Africa have?
Africa holds about 125 billion barrels of proven crude oil reserves, representing 7.2 percent of the world’s total. Proven reserves are oil that has been discovered and can be extracted commercially with existing technology, but is still underground.
Libya and Nigeria account for almost 70 percent of Africa’s reserves, with 48.4 billion and 36.9 billion barrels respectively. Algeria comes in third position, with 12.2 billion barrels. Angola follows with 7.78 billion barrels, while South Sudan and Egypt hold 3.75 billion and 3.3 billion barrels respectively.
Nigeria was Africa’s largest oil producer in 2024, accounting for about 23% of the continent’s production. Algeria and Angola followed with about 17 percent each, and together the three produced 56 percent of Africa’s oil. The top five producers accounted for more than 80 percent. Africa as a whole produced 7.6 percent of the world’s crude oil, roughly matching its share of global reserves.
Libya, which holds Africa’s largest proven reserves, ranks only fourth in terms of production. Italy’s Eni, France’s TotalEnergies and Spain’s Repsol are among the foreign companies operating in the country, where political conflicts and blockades have repeatedly disrupted production.
Where are Africa’s natural gas reserves?
Africa held almost 18 trillion cubic meters of proven natural gas reserves at the end of 2023.
Nigeria and Algeria hold about 58 percent of the total, followed by Mozambique with 2.84 trillion cubic meters, Egypt with 2.21 trillion and Libya with 1.51 trillion.
Algeria and Nigeria are also among Africa’s top gas exporters, while much of Mozambique’s reserves, discovered offshore in the 2010s, remain largely underexploited.
Where do critical minerals come from?
The African continent supplies much of the minerals used in electric vehicles, batteries and renewable energy technologies.
In 2025, African countries accounted for 71.2 percent of global cobalt production and 72.4 percent of manganese production.
Cobalt is used in rechargeable batteries. Manganese is primarily used to strengthen steel, but it is also used in some electric vehicle batteries and in batteries that store renewable energy.
The Democratic Republic of Congo produces nearly 70 percent of the world’s cobalt. Some of it is dug by hand by artisanal miners, and Amnesty International has documented the dangerous and often deadly conditions in some of the country’s mines.
South Africa produces almost 38 percent of the world’s manganese, followed by Gabon with almost 25 percent. Together with Ghana, these three countries account for 72.4 percent of global production.
Zimbabwe, Africa’s largest lithium producer, accounted for 9.6% of global production in 2025. Lithium is used in rechargeable batteries that power electric vehicles and store electricity from solar and wind power.
Madagascar, Mozambique and Tanzania together produced 222,000 tonnes of natural graphite in 2025, or 11.9% of the world total. Graphite is used in the anodes of most lithium-ion batteries, the negative electrodes that store and release energy, as well as in the manufacture of steel, lubricants and pencils.
How many African countries produce electricity from renewable energies?
Renewable energy accounted for all electricity generated in Ethiopia and the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2024. Uganda, Namibia and Eswatini each produced more than 96% from renewable energy, mainly hydropower.
At the other end, renewable energy accounted for less than 5 percent in Algeria, Libya, Niger and Tunisia, which rely mainly on gas or oil.
Ethiopia’s electricity comes primarily from hydropower, led by the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam on the Blue Nile, Africa’s largest hydroelectric project. The dam began generating electricity in 2022 and was officially opened in September 2025.
Where do people have access to electricity?
By 2024, six African countries have declared universal access to electricity: Algeria, Egypt, Mauritius, Morocco, Seychelles and Tunisia. Together they are home to around 215 million people, or around 14 percent of Africa’s population.
Elsewhere, access varies considerably. In South Sudan, only 5.4 percent of the population had electricity. This figure was 15.6 percent in Malawi and 22.5 percent in the Democratic Republic of Congo, even though the DRC produces all its electricity from renewable energy.
Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country, had an access rate of 62.5 percent, leaving about 85 million people without electricity, the most of any country in the world.
In rural areas, where access is much more difficult than in cities, many families still rely on kerosene lamps, candles or torches to light their homes after dark.
Africa has vast energy resources, from oil and natural gas to minerals that fuel the global energy transition. Yet more than 560 million people in sub-Saharan Africa lack access to electricity, representing about 86 percent of the global total, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
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