Democratic Republic of the Congo's natural resources

• Official Name: Democratic Republic of the Congo; also known as Kinshasa.

Summary: Because of its rich natural resources, the Democratic Republic of the Congo has been the target of foreign invasions. Thus, in spite of its potentially extensive hydroelectric capacity, lack of international investments and inadequate infrastructure plague the country’s energy sector.

The significant natural resources for the production of energy in the Democratic Republic of the Congo have been one of the main reasons for the military conflicts fought for the control of the country. A Belgian colony until 1960, the Democratic Republic of the Congo has experienced several political coups that have led to the violent removal of several leaders, including Patrice Lumumba, Mobutu Sese Seko, and Laurent-Désiré Kabila. In the late 1990s, the country became the battleground for the ethnic tensions between Hutus and Tutsis in neighboring Rwanda. The war that followed soon spread to other countries in the region, such as Uganda, Zimbabwe, Angola, and Namibia. The conflict resulted in a genocide that claimed the lives of more than 3 million people and strained the country’s resources, leading many of its people to face famine and disease. Although a cease-fire was signed in 2002, the ethnic tensions continue to ravage the eastern regions of the republic. This constant political instability has made it difficult for the different Congolese governments to find the financial resources needed to invest in reforms of the energy sector.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo has the second-largest freshwater river in the world, the Congo, which is the first as far as the strength of the water flow is concerned. This is estimated at 1.5 million cubic feet per second. The 328-foot (100-meter) Inga Falls on the Congo River is generally considered the leading single supply of hydroelectric power in the world.

In the 1970s, the first phases of an ambitious hydroelectric project in the areas of the falls were completed. Inga I and Inga II hydroelectric sites currently operate at much less than their potential capacity, however, given the lack of maintenance and international investment in the face of the instability that has characterized the Democratic Republic’s recent history. As of 2025, the Congo had received funding and planned to build a third hydroelectric site, Inga III, which could provide a quarter of Africa's electricity. Inga III would be a 40GW or 44GW project, much larger than the combined capacity of Inga I and II, which is 1.8GW. Like the other two sites, Inga III would be built near Inga Falls. Construction on Inga III was anticipated to begin in 2026 and conclude in 2030.

Although Inga III could solve Africa’s chronic lack of electricity and could become a source of exports for other continents, it has its critics. Local and international environmental organizations object that the project would increase the country’s already considerable reliance on hydropower at a time when the entire African continent is becoming more vulnerable to droughts induced by climate changes. Second, they point out that so far industries have benefited from the Inga sites more than citizens and poorer areas, whose access to electricity remains limited. As of 2024, despite the millions of dollars put into improving the country's power grid, only 19 percent of the population had access to electricity—41 percent of people in urban areas and just 1 percent of people in rural areas. The Democratic Republic of the Congo has oil reserves that are primarily located in the four major lakes bordering Tanzania, Burundi, Rwanda, and Uganda. The country produces approximately 19,000 barrels of oil per day, according to the World Factbook in 2025.

Bibliography

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