With lush, fertile land and a reputation as South Africa’s breadbasket, the province of Limpopo has come to be known by some as Africa’s Eden. But Limpopo’s expansive forests, national parks, indigenous heritage sites, and even the citizens themselves are now in danger as a massive industrial zone is slated for construction in the region.
Backed by the Chinese company Shenzhen Hoi Mor, the proposed Musina-Makhado Energy-Metallurgical Special Economic Zone (EMSEZ) will cover 60 square kilometers of land and contain at least a dozen industrial facilities. These facilities include a coking coal mine, a coal washery, a coking plant, an iron making plant, and a steel making plant, as well as a coal-fired power station to fuel these activities. Though supporters have presented the EMSEZ as a tool to boost economic activity and employment through foreign direct investment and the creation of approximately 54,000 jobs, a closer look at the project reveals the risk of more dire consequences for Limpopo: habitat destruction, increased emissions, and harmful health consequences for the province’s residents.
Limpopo’s selection as the site for the zone has been based on the area’s close proximity to abundant minerals and road networks, without any regard for the region’s precious natural environment. More than 100,000 indigenous and protected tree species populate the area. The EMSEZ will also infringe on the ancestral land of the Mulambwane people, replacing the graves and mopane trees currently found there with environmentally harmful industrial facilities.This construction will disrupt long-standing traditions, such as the bi-annual collection of mopane worms by local women as a source of food and income.
Even worse, the EMSEZ will significantly increase greenhouse gas emissions in the area, hindering South Africa’s ability to achieve its pledge of net-zero emissions by 2050. Coal-fired power stations currently account for 77 percent of the country’s electrical output, earning South Africa the title of Africa’s biggest emitter of carbon dioxide. And with the EMSEZ expected to generate approximately 1 billion tons of carbon dioxide over the course of its operation, the country’s emissions will only increase, further fueling the climate-related droughts and floods already affecting the region.
The project will have dire health consequences for the region’s people as well. Environmental activists and residents of Limpopo have voiced major concerns regarding the health risks associated with pollution from the EMSEZ. As Lawrence Neluheni, a construction worker from Mudimeli, has said of the situation, “Of course we want jobs… But we also want our health - if you are rich but you are sick, then what is the point?” Additionally, a lack of communication regarding the types of jobs the project would create has left some residents skeptical of its potential to bring them economic prosperity.
Reduced access to vital resources is another major issue threatening people even beyond the province of Limpopo. The EMSEZ will require 80 million cubic meters of water per year, and while the project’s environmental impact assessment identifies a possible water source in Zimbabwe, the groundwater scarcity already plaguing the region would put those living in the area under immense stress if the source is selected for use. Critics of the EMSEZ have called for assurance that the region’s groundwater will be kept safe if the project is to move forward.
Adding an additional layer of injustice to the issue is China’s stake in the project. Shenzhen Hoi Mor, a Chinese company, has reportedly pledged to invest $3.8 billion of the total $16.8 billion invested in the EMSEZ, and the South African Energy Metallurgical Base to which the EMSEZ operator permit was issued is a subsidiary of the company. In exchange for its involvement in the project, China will likely reap many benefits as an export partner for products and materials produced in the EMSEZ, perpetuating a harmful system of neo-colonial exploitation and one-sided trade agreements that has plagued Africa for decades. China mainly imports raw natural resources like metals and minerals from Africa and exports cheap finished goods like machinery and plastics back to the continent, forming a dependent relationship between the two and undercutting local manufacturers.
Over 100 objections have been launched in protest of the zone by local groups such as Save Our Limpopo Valley and the Centre for Environmental Rights, but as of March 2021 no conflict has been documented near the proposed site. Although the Limpopo Department of Economic Development, Environment, and Tourism placed a temporary hold on the EMSEZ earlier in the year due to incompletion of its environmental impact assessment, the project has been resumed and was reported to be nearing the end of the planning and feasibility stage as of April 2021. One official has estimated that it could take upwards of 10 years to fully complete construction of the zone.
Described by environmental law attorney Michelle Koyama as a project entailing “the development of massive, unnecessary, and expensive polluting infrastructure,” the EMSEZ has serious potential to exacerbate climate change and harm both Limpopo’s people and natural environment while primarily benefiting foreign corporations. With all of its associated risks, the priorities of this project and others like it show that neo-colonial extractivism of Africa is alive and well in the 21st Century. And now, we have the experience and scientific foresight to understand that it should be stopped.
