Paper short abstract:

Border points between Zambia and DRC are nodes in the global value chains. Infrastructures development (roads, gates…) and their funding are crucial means of access for international, regional and national corporate and political bodies to the revenues extracted on the circulations of goods.

Paper long abstract:

A 2000km long border divides the DRC and Zambia, and zigzag across the mineral-rich Copperbelt. On this border, only a few crossing points allow the export of minerals (copper and cobalt ores mostly) from Katanga to the harbors of Durban and Dar-es-Salaam, and the import of chemical, machineries and foodstuffs on the other way around. These border points are thus constituted as interfaces on the system, and can not be bypassed. They became main sites for and rent-capturing activities and have concentrated attention from international, regional, national corporate and political bodies, willing to position themselves on profitable flows. Political and commercial flows have a mutual influence on each other : commercial flows shape the infrastructural architecture which in return orientate the flows of goods, or make them divert. Mining flows have historically prevailed in the area, but now all types of flows have to adapt to the inertia of geographies the latter have created. Political and private entities, though infrastructure building and funding have the power to make some routes faster but also more expensive. The result is a changing landscape, changing arrangements, opening of new routes when the old ones become too crowded or too expensive. This contribution will look into the diverse strategies of this large array of actors involving into trade and infrastructures, and show how power and commercial flows tend to concentrate themselves on a very few numbers of crossing points, tending to be aligned on colonial and neoliberal polarization of space.