Mozambique miner Montepuez Ruby Mining (MRM) has been recognised as the country’s second-biggest exporter in the mining sector last year, and as the largest exporter from the northern province of Cabo Delgado, where its mine is located. MRM received these recognitions from the Export Promotion Institute of Mozambique. Montepuez is 75%-owned by UK company Gemfields and 25% by Mozambique private enterprise Mwiriti.

MRM accrued export earnings of more than $74-million last year, taking the total since it started operations in 2012 to more than $196-million. (The first auction of the company’s rubies took place in Singapore in June 2014.) The company’s concession area covers some 336 km2 and includes both primary and secondary ruby deposits. MRM also produces corundum.

Gemfields’ CEO Ian Harebottle received the certificate confirming MRM’s status as the country’s number two mining exporter in 2015 from Mozambique Economy and Finance Minister Adriano Maleiane in Maputo last week. At the ceremony, Harebottle highlighted that Mozambique’s rubies were unique and were getting a good reception overseas, a fact demonstrated by the success of the company’s ruby auctions, of which there have been six so far. It is believed that Mozambique has the most significant ruby deposits outside Myanmar.

The most recent of these auctions took place in June in Singapore (all but one of the auctions have been held in the island State; the third was the exception, taking place in Jaipur, in India). No more auctions are planned for this financial year. The June auction saw the sale of 71 of the 75 lots offered, or 1 516 459 ct sold out of the 1 601 145 ct offered. This amounted to 95% of the lots being sold, or 98% of the lots by market value. The total monetary value of the sales was $44.3-million, at $29.21/ct. The proceeds of the auction were repatriated to MRM in Mozambique and royalties will be paid on the full sales price to the Mozambique government.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the continent, Angola’s Secretary of State for Geology and Mines, Miguel Júnior, has affirmed that the Cunene formation of “ornamental stone” (dimension stone) is the biggest such formation in the world. He was speaking in the city of Lubango, capital of the south-western province of Huíla. Lubango is the site of one of the regional laboratories being developed by the Geological Institute of Angola, as part of the country’s National Geology Plan.

The Secretary of State was leading an international delegation of 40 specialists on a geological tour of the Huíla and Namibe provinces. They visited areas where exploration for ornamental stone is under way, within the municipal district of Chibia. They also visited an iron-ore project at Cassinga. The specialists came from Angola, Australia, Brazil, Portugal, South Africa, Spain and the US. All had attended the 35th International Geological Congress, in Cape Town (which ran from August 27 to September 4).

Two years ago, Geology and Mines Minister Francisco Queiroz announced that the use of ornamental stone mined and processed in Angola would become compulsory for all public works in the country. “Angola produces quality ornamental stone, such as black granite and marble,” he said at the time. “[W]henever there is State money in any [construction] work, the [ornamental] stone will be national.” Up to that time, ornamental stone quarried in the country had been exported, unprocessed, to Europe, particularly to Italy, Portugal and Spain, where it was finished.