Ethiopia, the source of more than 80% of the Nile's flow, currently uses less than 1% of it. This drought-ridden country now wants to take water from the Blue Nile, perhaps by damming its source, Lake Tana. But Ethiopia is not party to the [Nile Water Agreement], made between Egypt and the Sudan in 1959, and its downstream neighbours acknowledge no right for it to dam the river's waters. Egypt's former foreign minister and later UN Secretary General, Boutros Boutros-Ghali, prophesied that the next war in the region would be over the waters of the Nile.
In 2001, Morocco awarded a contracts to prospect for offshore oil on the Western Sahara coast to two foreign companies, American and French. According to the United Nations, the treaty signed by Morocco and the decolonizing power Spain in 1975 did not transfer sovereignty of the Western Sahara and did not make Morocco the administrator for the territory, which may be called a "non-self-governing territory" whilst Morocco continues as an occupying power. The Saharawi people are also concerned about the exploitation of their fisheries resources by Spain in arrangements with the Moroccan government.