Malindi Assubuji is currently a student in the Master’s Programme in International and European Law at NOVA School of Law. She holds a Bachelor’s Degree in political science and international relations from the NOVA Faculty of Social and Human Sciences.
In 2024, the European Commission took a crucial step for the protection and promotion of human rights and sustainable development with the adoption of the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD). Building on existing internationally recognized soft-law instruments on Business and Human Rights and Responsible Business Conduct, the CSDDD introduces binding due diligence obligations that require companies to identify, prevent and address potential and actual human rights and environmental impacts arising from their own activities and across their value chains. The CSDDD forms a core component of Europe’s broader green transition, reinforcing the shift toward a sustainable economy that is highly dependent on critical raw materials.
Besides being the first horizontal mandatory Human Rights and Environmental Due Diligence (HREDD) law at the European level, the CSDDD (pronounced ‘CS triple D’) has a distinct transnational reach. It applies to certain activities done by companies’ upstream and downstream partners, covering a significant part of their value chains. In practice, any economic actor integrated into a European supply chain may be required by companies bound by the CSDDD to comply with the established standards so that those companies can meet their own obligations under the directive.
Against this backdrop, African suppliers are set to be indirectly impacted by the directive, especially in the supply chain of strategic raw materials. South Africa alone accounts for 41% of the EU’s manganese imports and 71% of its platinum, while Guinea supplies 63% of the EU’s aluminium, all three resources considered essential for the bloc’s sustainable development.
Research on South African manganese extraction has shown the severe impacts of the European energy transition on miners and the local communities living near extraction sites. Water scarcity, asbestos exposure, tuberculosis and exploitative working conditions are amongst the risks faced by residents of manganese-extractive areas. Women and girls, in particular, are disproportionately affected. They face heightened risks of gender-based violence alongside a lack of affordable healthcare, job security, and economic opportunities. The South African case illustrates how current market dynamics are often misaligned with the fundamental human and environmental rights, a pattern that is widespread across the global mining industry.
These adverse impacts fall squarely within the areas of concern addressed by the CSDDD, which is likely to affect African suppliers in at least two major ways. First, European companies will be required to strengthen their human rights and environmental due diligence processes, which include audits and certification checks, and extend to measures such as stakeholder engagement, risk assessments, remediation, and beyond. Second, African suppliers will face rising operational costs in order to meet these stricter due diligence requirements, particularly if in-scope European companies do not provide adequate support and capacity-building along their value chains.
Africa’s abundance of resources is often tied to low production costs. However, low costs frequently come at the expense of human and environmental rights. Raising standards under the CSDDD will inevitably increase production costs, not only through ensuring decent working hours and living wages, but also by requiring sustainable practices, robust reporting, and compliance mechanisms that meet European expectations. By pushing global supply chains towards higher standards, the CSDDD has the potential to foster responsible business conduct and sustainable practices within African industries.
Returning to the manganese example, a binding legal framework that strengthens protection for miners and affected communities can help rebalance the relationship between exporters and importers. It can address not only the adverse impacts linked to extraction, but also the lack of development and growth in resource-rich areas that have long contributed to Europe’s economic growth and hold the potential to drive Africa’s as well.
However, the directive’s direct implications for African companies are likely to remain limited: it only directly concerns African companies that, themselves, generate an annual net turnover of more than 450 million euros in the EU market, and, indirectly, African suppliers that are part of the supply chains of in-scope European companies. At its core, the Directive remains a European legal framework.
The momentum generated by the CSDDD and the inevitable impacts it will have across Africa creates a valuable opportunity to establish an Africa-owned business and human rights framework. The challenges faced by manganese miners in South Africa mirror those experienced by cobalt miners in the Democratic Republic of Congo and by graphite miners in Mozambique. The overall goal to regulate extractive industries in order to protect human rights and the environment is shared by resource-rich countries which depend on its exports and could be advanced through a regional African framework that both links to Europe’s sustainable development and to Africa’s economic growth and resilience.
The Nairobi Declaration of 2024, which came from a collaboration between the United Nations and the African Union at the African Business and Human Rights Forum, encourages African governments to align their national laws to international human rights standards, to develop national action plans on business and human rights, and to prioritize the protection of vulnerable groups. While it represents a commendable step towards responsible business practices, it lacks binding force and, therefore, enforcement mechanisms that could accelerate the adoption of effective policies.
A transnational African framework on business and human rights could fill this gap. By reducing the risk of legal-neo-colonization , it would empower African businesses to compete on fairer terms in international markets, safeguard the human and environmental rights of citizens, and attract sustainable investment to the continent. Such an initiative would allow Africa not only to adapt to European standards in order to preserve vital economic ties and market access, but also to assert its agency in the international system and advance its own path to sustainable development.
Suggested citation: M. Assubuji, ‘The Trickle-Down Effects of the CSDDD: Towards an African Framework on Business and Human Rights?’, NOVA BHRE Blog, 4 December 2025