The Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, GI-TOC, will launch a new flagship research report on organized crime and instability in West Africa, which maps illicit hubs across the region.
The report will be launched on Wednesday, September 7.
Covering 18 countries and 280 hubs of illicit activity identified across West Africa, the Sahel and Central Africa, the illicit hub mapping initiative, the Illicit Economies and Instability Monitor, IEIM, and the accompanying report visualize illicit economy hotspots, transit points and crime zones in the region.
“Until now, there has been no systematic attempt to evaluate the impact of regional illicit economies on conflict and instability.
“Within this flagship project of the GI-TOC’s Observatory of Illicit Economies in West Africa, the IEIM is a new metric to assess how much specific hubs drive instability in the region. Illicit economies and instability are complex and intertwining phenomena, but the dynamics of the connection between crime and conflict are often misunderstood.
“The deteriorating security situation across areas of West Africa, the Sahel, Cameroon and the Central African Republic underscores the importance of better understanding this relationship.
“This work presents an important step forwards in better understanding the complex relationship between illicit economies and instability in West Africa, and supporting policymakers in designing tailored and crime-sensitive stabilization programmes,” said Mark Shaw, director of the GI-TOC.
The key findings of this mapping project are outlined in the report ‘Organized crime and instability dynamics: Mapping illicit hubs in West Africa’.
