Petra Diamonds CEO Johan Dippenaar
Photo by: Duane Daws
JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – LSE-listed Petra Diamonds has entered into a joint venture (JV) with Kimberley, South Africa-based diamond mining company Ekapa Mining, combining the operations into an unincorporated JV dubbed the Kimberley Ekapa Mining Joint Venture (KEM JV).
The effective date of the JV agreement was July 1 and would lead to a 75.9% interest for Petra and its black economic empowerment partners, and a 24.1% interest for Ekapa Mining.
"The KEM JV is expected to bring significant synergies to the operations at Kimberley, including the ability to increase throughput and reduce operating costs, thereby extending the operation's mine life," said Petra CEO Johan Dippenaar.
The respective operations comprise Petra's Kimberley Underground mines, as well as Ekapa Mining's tailings operations, the Kimberley Miners Forum and the Kimberley Mines tailings operations.
Ekapa Minerals acquired Kimberley Mines from De Beers Consolidated Mines in January, which introduced a number of producing tailing deposits in the Kimberley area, as well as a six-million-tonnes-a-year combined treatment plant.