Libreville, Gabon – The vital discussion surrounding the local transformation of Africa’s natural resources is no longer confined to government offices, international conferences, or corporate boardrooms. Instead, this crucial conversation is now taking place within university lecture halls, vocational training centers, and the educational journeys of the next generation.
In Gabon, the third iteration of the Yam’NA program, a collaborative initiative by Eramet Comilog and SETRAG, perfectly embodies this evolving approach. While the headline highlights fifty new scholarships for Gabonese high school graduates, the underlying strategy is far more ambitious: to cultivate the essential skills that will drive Gabon’s industrial transformation for decades to come.
Officially inaugurated on July 10 in Libreville, this latest edition signifies a significant advancement for the framework initially established in 2024 by Eramet Comilog. This original setup was part of the Eramet group’s “Beyond” program and its “Act for Positive Mining” corporate social responsibility strategy. Since its inception, approximately fifty Gabonese students have already received support to pursue their higher education within Gabon.
The inclusion of SETRAG as a partner for this third edition ushers in a new phase for the program, significantly strengthening its national scope. This collaboration now unites Gabon’s mining industry with its most vital railway infrastructure, all focused on a singular objective: investing in Gabonese human capital.
Cultivating skills for future industries
For many decades, African extractive economies primarily exported raw materials, simultaneously importing the technical expertise required for their processing. Today, Gabon is actively working to reverse this long-standing trend.
The fifty new scholarships awarded for the 2026-2027 academic year will specifically target sectors deemed strategic for Gabon’s future prosperity. Priority fields include metallurgy, steelmaking, industrial chemistry, agri-food, agroforestry, and professions integral to the green economy.
This strategic shift is far from trivial. It directly supports national aspirations to enhance the local processing of natural resources, foster greater value creation within the country, and progressively diminish reliance on foreign expertise.
The significance of this initiative extends well beyond merely ensuring job placement for the participating students. Its core purpose is to proactively develop the engineers, technicians, metallurgists, environmental specialists, industrial process experts, and middle managers who will drive tomorrow’s projects for transforming Gabonese manganese, iron, timber, and agricultural products.
In a global landscape shaped by the energy transition and intense competition for strategic minerals, resource-rich nations now face a new imperative. Simply possessing resources is no longer sufficient; countries must also cultivate the skills necessary to process them domestically and capture their full economic value.
Investing in economic sovereignty
The Yam’NA program is designed for young Gabonese individuals under the age of twenty-five who have successfully completed their baccalaureate on the first attempt and aspire to pursue higher education within Gabon in technical, industrial, or environmental fields. Applications are being accepted from July 8 to July 28, 2026.
Beyond providing financial assistance to students, this framework also aims to more closely align the demands of the real economy with university curricula and national training policies.
This particular issue currently represents a significant challenge for many African economies. Businesses often struggle to recruit specific specialized skills, while graduates face hurdles entering fields that are either oversaturated or poorly matched to emerging industrial requirements.
The partnership between Eramet Comilog and SETRAG thus emerges as a tangible effort to address this systemic problem.
As the leading private employer in Haut-Ogooué, supporting nearly 3,500 direct jobs through its Comilog and SETRAG railway subsidiaries, the French group Eramet stands as a pivotal economic force in Gabon and the broader sub-region.
SETRAG, for its part, operates the 648-kilometer Transgabonais railway, connecting the interior mining regions to the port of Owendo. Annually, this vital line facilitates the transport of nearly nine million tons of goods and serves hundreds of thousands of passengers.
The development challenge: a battle of skills
Africa is steadily entering a new era of economic development where the primary focus is shifting beyond mere infrastructure or investment. The central question now revolves around the availability of skilled human capital to navigate industrial transformations. In this global competition, success will likely favor nations capable of harnessing their youth as the main engine for value creation.
The Yam’NA program aligns with this long-term vision. By guiding students toward careers in local resource transformation and professions within the green economy, Gabon aims to proactively address its future industrial needs rather than react to them.
The objective is unequivocal: to cultivate a generation capable not only of extracting the nation’s resources but, critically, of transforming them, enhancing their value, and leveraging them as a sustainable pillar of economic sovereignty.