Column: Electric dreams turn into a nightmare for battery metals
A sector that was once racing to build new supply has been closing mines and deferring projects as low prices bite into the cost curve.
Zimbabwe will introduce incentives to encourage mining companies to process their output locally, President Emmerson Mnangagwa said.
“Bold decisions must be taken” to speed up the expansion of mineral beneficiation and value addition, he said at a mining conference in Bulawayo, the second largest city, on Thursday. He didn’t elaborate.
The plan fits within a wider push across Africa to add value to natural resources before exporting them to reap greater economic rewards.
Ghana, Africa’s biggest gold producer, opened a new refinery in August and Nigerian billionaire Aliko Dangote’s mega-oil refinery started operating this year.
Zimbabwe has the world’s third-largest known platinum reserves after Russia and South Africa. Platinum producers in the country include units of Zimplats Holdings Ltd. and Anglo American Platinum Ltd.
The southern African nation is also the continent’s largest producer of lithium — a key raw material in electric-vehicle batteries — and has attracted significant investment from Chinese firms, including Chengxin Lithium Group Co. Ltd., Sinomine Resource Group Co. Ltd and Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt Co. Ltd.
In the last two years, Zimbabwe has banned the export of unprocessed raw lithium and “base minerals” to boost domestic processing.
(By Ray Ndlovu)
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