Former Shell, Anglo leaders back new body to ease resource conflict

Resource Resolutions (RR), a new venture aimed at reducing growing societal and geopolitical divisions around natural resources, has announced a global advisory council comprised of eminent figures from industry, international diplomacy and academia to guide its work.

These include two leading executives who have provided seed capital for the venture:

• Chad Holliday, former chair of Royal Dutch Shell, former chair of Bank of America, and former CEO of DuPont. Holliday has also served as chair of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development and chair of Mission Possible Partnership. He is the lead investor in RR and its chief advisor.
• Mark Cutifani, the former CEO of Anglo American (LSE: AAL), current chair of Vale‘s (NYSE: VALE) base metals unit, and former CEO of AngloGold Ashanti (NYSE: AU). He’s known for his leadership in transforming companies and advocating for responsible mining practices. Cutifani is also a board member of TotalEnergies and Laing O’Rourke.

Other members of the advisory council are:

• Prof. Elizabeth Robinson, Acting Dean, Global School of Sustainability at the London School of Economics. A leading environmental economist, Robinson has also been the director of the LSE’s Grantham Institute on Climate Change, and has over 25 years of research experience, particularly in low-income countries.
• Dame Meg Taylor, former Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum. A leading advocate for conflict resolution and sustainable development, Taylor was founding vice president of the Compliance Advisor Ombudsman at the World Bank, and ambassador of Papua New Guinea to the U.S., Mexico and Canada.
• Kandeh K. Yumkella, former UN Under-Secretary General, former founding CEO of the Sustainable Energy for All initiative, and former Director-General of the United Nations Industrial Development Organization. A distinguished development and agricultural economist, Yumkella is now chairman of the Presidential Initiative on Climate Change, Renewable Energy and Food Security in Sierra Leone.

“We are delighted to welcome these illustrious figures to our global advisory council,” Daniel Litvin, founder of RR, said in a release on Friday. “Geopolitical tensions, climate change, societal polarization and distrust may lead to more and more conflict over natural resources in the years ahead.”

The council aims to help identify how to create common ground between different groups, companies, government, local community and civil society, Litvin said.

He previously founded Critical Resource, an advisory firm on sustainability and geopolitical risks which he sold in 2020 to ERM, the world’s largest sustainability consulting firm. He is also a Visiting Senior Fellow at the London School of Economics and author of ‘Empires of Profit: Commerce, Conquest and Corporate Responsibility’.

The co-founder of RR is Chris Melville, formerly head of political risk with Tullow Oil, an Africa-focused upstream oil and gas company. Melville is a qualified community mediator and conflict resolution expert.

Greenland example

The founding of RR follows U.S. President Donald Trump’s recent remarks about annexing Greenland, which has a strategic location and an abundance of critical mineral deposits. 

Holliday told Bloomberg last week the Greenland issue is raising awareness about natural resources and how to use them to benefit 8 billion people on the planet. 

Holliday also noted there’s a need to improve how those involved in natural resources deal with one another. At DuPont, for example, he said that some business leaders were poor at taking in different perspectives. They learned they needed to listen better, he said. 

Resource Resolutions, therefore, will have countless opportunities to smooth natural resource tensions through reconciliation, he added.

The venture, overseen by the global advisory council, is to employ mediators and experts with experience working in natural resources and dealing with governments, local communities, hostile groups and commodities firms. They will encourage dialogue and try to anticipate any conflict before it happens.