Nigeria’s first industrial gold project is on course to enter production next year and its success would be crucial for boosting mining in Africa’s biggest oil producer, the country’s mines minister said.
Thor Explorations Ltd is spending US$98 million to develop the project, which is to have an annual average output of 80,000 ounces.
The Canada-based company’s Segilola mine in the southwest should yield gold by the end of the first quarter of next year, Nigerian Minister of Mines and Steel Development Olamilekan Adegbite told reporters in the capital, Abuja, on Friday.
Photo: Reuter
The West African nation has sizable untapped deposits of metals, including iron ore, gold, zinc and lead, but almost all extraction is done on a small-scale or manual basis. The government wants to increase mining’s contribution to GDP to 3 percent by 2025, from less than 0.1 percent currently.
Thor is “the proverbial company that dares to jump in the shark-infested water and see whether it survives,” Adegbite said.
Gold for December delivery on Friday rose US$31.30 to US$1,926.20 an ounce, up 0.5 percent for the week.
Progress at Segilola would be key to attracting other mining companies to Nigeria, which offers incentives, including tax holidays and customs waivers on imported equipment, he said.
Successive administrations have pledged to grow mining’s role in the economy since Nigeria restored multiparty democracy in 1999.
Legislation to expand the sector was passed more than a decade ago.
Lagos, Nigeria-based Africa Finance Corp is backing Thor through a US$86 million debt equity financing package.
LITHIUM
The nation sitting on half the world’s lithium reserves has a calming message for electric-vehicle makers: Tougher environmental oversight would not threaten future production of the metal used to make batteries.
Chile’s environmental regulator is working with other agencies to devise a plan for improving supervision of mining companies that pump out hundreds of liters a second of lithium-laced brine from beneath the Atacama salt flat.
Under pressure from investors and customers, miners are investing millions to reduce their footprint and they too have said that should not constrain output.
While the main objective is to mitigate the impact on the fragile ecosystem and local communities, the new integrated approach to oversight should not jeopardize production in an era in which sustainability is a starting point, said Cristobal de La Maza, who heads the agency known as SMA.
The Chilean expansion plans of Albemarle Corp and local rival SQM are crucial for the industry to meet demand that is expected to triple in the coming years, with lithium a key ingredient in batteries that power vehicles and mobile phones.
“We don’t think this is something that goes against economic interests, although our role is clearly environmental,” De La Maza said by telephone on Thursday. “In environmental matters, what was valid 30 years, today isn’t acceptable.”
The initial reaction from companies has been positive, he said, adding that they understand Chile has to be competitive not only in production, but also in environmental standards.
On the same day as De La Maza spoke, SQM announced plans to cut its use of brine in half and produce carbon-neutral lithium by 2030 — without restraining output.
That follows a lost legal battle that forced the Santiago-based company to redo a plan to address over-pumping of brine.
Other metals:
‧Silver for December delivery on Friday rose US$1.23 to US$25.11 an ounce, up 3.5 percent for the week.
‧Copper for December delivery on Friday rose US$0.04 to US$3.08 a pound.
Additional reporting by AP, with staff writer
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) is expected to miss the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump on Monday, bucking a trend among high-profile US technology leaders. Huang is visiting East Asia this week, as he typically does around the time of the Lunar New Year, a person familiar with the situation said. He has never previously attended a US presidential inauguration, said the person, who asked not to be identified, because the plans have not been announced. That makes Nvidia an exception among the most valuable technology companies, most of which are sending cofounders or CEOs to the event. That includes
TARIFF TRADE-OFF: Machinery exports to China dropped after Beijing ended its tariff reductions in June, while potential new tariffs fueled ‘front-loaded’ orders to the US The nation’s machinery exports to the US amounted to US$7.19 billion last year, surpassing the US$6.86 billion to China to become the largest export destination for the local machinery industry, the Taiwan Association of Machinery Industry (TAMI, 台灣機械公會) said in a report on Jan. 10. It came as some manufacturers brought forward or “front-loaded” US-bound shipments as required by customers ahead of potential tariffs imposed by the new US administration, the association said. During his campaign, US president-elect Donald Trump threatened tariffs of as high as 60 percent on Chinese goods and 10 percent to 20 percent on imports from other countries.
Taiwanese manufacturers have a chance to play a key role in the humanoid robot supply chain, Tongtai Machine and Tool Co (東台精機) chairman Yen Jui-hsiung (嚴瑞雄) said yesterday. That is because Taiwanese companies are capable of making key parts needed for humanoid robots to move, such as harmonic drives and planetary gearboxes, Yen said. This ability to produce these key elements could help Taiwanese manufacturers “become part of the US supply chain,” he added. Yen made the remarks a day after Nvidia Corp cofounder and chief executive officer Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said his company and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) are jointly
MARKET SHIFTS: Exports to the US soared more than 120 percent to almost one quarter, while ASEAN has steadily increased to 18.5 percent on rising tech sales The proportion of Taiwan’s exports directed to China, including Hong Kong, declined by more than 12 percentage points last year compared with its peak in 2020, the Ministry of Finance said on Thursday last week. The decrease reflects the ongoing restructuring of global supply chains, driven by escalating trade tensions between Beijing and Washington. Data compiled by the ministry showed China and Hong Kong accounted for 31.7 percent of Taiwan’s total outbound sales last year, a drop of 12.2 percentage points from a high of 43.9 percent in 2020. In addition to increasing trade conflicts between China and the US, the ministry said
RSS