Chad, the challenge of development

In the prelude to the current scramble for natural resources in Africa, several leading global oil companies and the World Bank (WB) got engaged in 2000 in a large oil extraction and export project in Chad, with a pipeline built across Cameroon to the Atlantic. The revenue management system then adopted by Chad under WB advice, designed to ensure the Chadian gains from this project would effectively support development could not entirely resist policy interests and domestic pressures to spend the proceeds in other ways than pre-accorded, including for security. The World Bank eventually pulled away from this venture but the human and social development impact of Chadian-determined uses of these resources has marked progress over comparable situations elsewhere.