NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

When Nigeria’s mining regulators cracked down on illegal diggers in 2023, it was an early sign the government had tired of being a raw material economy locked out of the most profitable parts of the minerals value chain. Even though hundreds of miners were arrested, many more were incentivized to form cooperatives as the authorities built digital registries to formalize local supply chains. By the end of 2024, mining revenues jumped more than 500% to $24 million, and this year two Chinese-backed lithium processing plants worth over $600 million are expected to open.