The Emerging Africa Infrastructure Fund (EAIF) is lending $30-million to London-listed Kenmare Resources as part of the financing announced on Friday for the $145-million expansion at the Moma mine, in Mozambique.
Kenmare is repaying all previous loans from EAIF.
The new $30-million loan has a five-year term and is designated to meet the cost of the new infrastructure needed to move heavy equipment and provide electricity at the company’s new location.
“Kenmare is buoyant and successful. Its new investment provides long-term job security for the workforce, extends the benefits Mozambique’s national finances enjoy from the company’s activities and brings new energy and transport infrastructure into the public realm. We are delighted to once again help Mozambique foster its economic and social stability,” says EAIF fund managers Investec Asset Management’s Martijn Proos.
The company’s new investment will see it complete one production site, open a new site at its current concession at Namalope and open up much larger new concession at Pilivili, some 20 km away. The overall aim of the business strategy is achieving an hourly production increase from 2 000 t to 2 400 t. The Moma mine is estimated to have 100 years of reserves.
One of the company’s giant earth-moving machines, a wet concentrator plant (WCP) is to be moved 20 km on a new, purpose-built road and over a newly constructed causeway across the River Mualadi to Pilvili. A specialist transporter used to move very large engineering structures will be used to carry the WPC along the new road. The transport infrastructure will become part of the public highway once the WCP has been moved, providing a significant economic development corridor for the local population and helping make the area more attractive to inward investors.
Investment in the Pilivili site will include other new production equipment and new energy infrastructure, which will also benefit adjacent villages.
About 540 people are expected to be employed in the construction phases at both sites.