Towards inclusive path transplantation: Local agency for green hydrogen linkage creation in Namibia

Many countries of the Global South struggle to achieve inclusive growth paths despite investment in the exploitation of rich resources. Resource-based industrialization literature stresses the potential for achieving broader development effects via the development of production linkages with local enterprises. The focus lies on market-driven outsourcing dynamics that foster linkage development, such as efficiency, location-specific knowledge, and technology and scale complexity. However, little is known about the opportunity space for both policy making and local firms to create these linkages. To address this issue, we incorporate the concept of change agency, stemming from the path development literature, into the discussion on production linkages to show how both (local) firm agency and system-level agency can achieve linkage creation for inclusive path transplantation. We illustrate the framework by scrutinizing the potential inclusion of solar energy companies in Namibia’s emerging green hydrogen economy. The study finds that while the potential for renewable energy companies in Namibia to participate in the value chain is limited, an integrated bundle of measures relying on firm- and system-level agency could address peripheral contextual factors, overcome entry barriers, and leverage further potential for linkage creation in the solar energy sector: mobilizing the local workforce, fostering inter-firm cooperation, leveraging local advantages, creating knowledge institutions, enhancing the regulatory framework, upgrading infrastructure, and enforcing local content regulations.