V. Y. KUKUSHKIN, Candidate of Economic Sciences, Institute of Africa, Russian Academy of Sciences Keywords: oil, natural gas, "Arab spring", North Africa, curse of resource abundance, rentier states For the oil and natural gas exporting countries of the North African region, which experienced a series of socio-economic, political and military upheavals in 2011-2014, often collectively referred to as the "Arab Spring", these events generally had serious negative consequences. 1 They affected key sectors of the oil and gas sector, as well as trends and prospects for economic development, either directly (in Libya, Sudan and South Sudan, as well as in Egypt), or mostly indirectly, which was typical for Algeria until the beginning of 2014. THE ARAB SPRING AND THE LOSSES OF ENERGY AND RAW MATERIALS INDUSTRIES In 2010, Libya, which produced 77.7 million tons of oil, ranked 1st in the region and 3rd in the African continent (after Nigeria and Angola). As a result of the civil war in 2011, with the active intervention of the armed forces of NATO and a number of its allies on the side of the rebels, Libyan oil production fell almost 3.5 times - to 22.5 million tons.In 2012, it was restored to levels close to pre-war levels. However, this revival proved to be very short-lived and shaky, mainly due to the acute contradictions within the country, primarily political, but also local, ethnic, clan, tribal and others, which led to repeated cases of blockade of pipeline communications and export infrastructure, especially oil and gas loading terminals. By November 2013, oil production again fell to about 12.5 million tons (in terms of annual rates), or more than 6.2 times in relation to the pre-war period. Almost simultaneously, there were repeated interruptions in the export supply of Libyan natural gas. These events have sharply worsened Libya's foreign trade position. The losses of the Sudanese oil and gas industry are quite comparable in scale to those of Libya, due to the divi ... Читать далее