Reuters | January 21, 2025 |
Zambia’s finance minister Situmbeko Musokotwane.
Credit: Ministry of Finance & National Planning – Zambia
Zambia is pinning its hopes on the mining sector for an economic revival after the worst drought in living memory caused a sharp slowdown in growth this year, its finance minister said on Tuesday.
Situmbeko Musokotwane told an event on the economic outlook that new mines were opening imminently and old mines were re-investing to lift output.
“If all goes according to plan, 2025 should be the start of this revival and it will be getting stronger and stronger each year going forward,” he said.
The government estimates last year’s copper production was over 770,000 tons, an increase on the 698,000 tons produced in 2023.
Zambia wants to raise copper output to about 1 million tons by 2026 and further out to 3 million tons.
A finance ministry presentation to the same event showed officials were still optimistic that economic growth would reach 6.6% this year.
The government has revised down its estimate for 2024 growth to 1.2% from the 2.3% forecast given in September due to the lingering effects of the drought, the presentation said.
Zambia is still targeting a budget deficit of 3.1% of gross domestic product (GDP) this year, higher than the latest estimate of last year’s deficit, which now stands at 2.7% of GDP.
The southern African country, the first African nation to default on its sovereign debt during the Covid-19 pandemic, has agreed restructuring terms for 90% of the external debt that it had hoped to restructure, the presentation also showed.
Zambian officials, including the secretary to the treasury and central bank governor, are in China to discuss some of the debt that still needs to be reworked, Musokotwane said.
(By Chris Mfula, Sfundo Parakozov and Tannur Anders; Editing by Alexander Winning and David Evans)
Zambia is pinning its hopes on the mining sector for an economic revival after the worst drought in living memory caused a sharp slowdown in growth this year, its finance minister said on Tuesday.
Situmbeko Musokotwane told an event on the economic outlook that new mines were opening imminently and old mines were re-investing to lift output.
“If all goes according to plan, 2025 should be the start of this revival and it will be getting stronger and stronger each year going forward,” he said.
The government estimates last year’s copper production was over 770,000 tons, an increase on the 698,000 tons produced in 2023.
Zambia wants to raise copper output to about 1 million tons by 2026 and further out to 3 million tons.
A finance ministry presentation to the same event showed officials were still optimistic that economic growth would reach 6.6% this year.
The government has revised down its estimate for 2024 growth to 1.2% from the 2.3% forecast given in September due to the lingering effects of the drought, the presentation said.
Zambia is still targeting a budget deficit of 3.1% of gross domestic product (GDP) this year, higher than the latest estimate of last year’s deficit, which now stands at 2.7% of GDP.
The southern African country, the first African nation to default on its sovereign debt during the Covid-19 pandemic, has agreed restructuring terms for 90% of the external debt that it had hoped to restructure, the presentation also showed.
Zambian officials, including the secretary to the treasury and central bank governor, are in China to discuss some of the debt that still needs to be reworked, Musokotwane said.
(By Chris Mfula, Sfundo Parakozov and Tannur Anders; Editing by Alexander Winning and David Evans)
Zambia says Saudi’s Manara interested in its copper assets
Reuters | January 16, 2025 |
Sentinel open-pit copper mine. (Image courtesy of First Quantum Minerals.)
Saudi Arabia’s Manara Minerals is looking for critical minerals projects in Zambia to invest in, the southern African country’s mines minister Paul Kabuswe told Reuters on Thursday.
Manara and Africa’s second-largest copper producer held talks on Wednesday after the signing the previous day of a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Saudi Arabia to cooperate on exploration for new minerals.
“They (Manara) are interested, but we do not know which ones yet,” he said on the sidelines of a mining conference in Riyadh, adding that an announcement on a potential mining deal between Zambia and Saudi Arabia is likely this year.
Saudi Arabia is among several Middle East economies pursuing deals in critical minerals, including copper and lithium, as part of de-facto ruler Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman’s strategy to wean the economy off its dependency on oil.
Manara, a joint venture between Saudi Arabian Mining Company 1211.SE and the kingdom’s $925 billion Public Investment Fund, is closing in on a deal to buy a minority stake in the Zambian copper and nickel assets of Canada’s First Quantum Minerals, Reuters reported in October.
First Quantum said on Wednesday that it is “assessing the potential benefits of a minority stake sale in Zambia”, as one of its priorities this year.
Kabuswe said while aware of the talks between Manara and First Quantum, Zambia’s government is not privy to details.
A new push by Zambia’s government to negotiate shareholdings as high as 30% in new mining projects has not impacted investor appetite, he said, although investors have had mixed feelings.
“We no longer want those agreements where we have 10% or 15%,” he said, adding that the government is also holding talks with Barrick Gold, Ivanhoe Mines and Chinese investors on their plans for new projects.
A newly-established copper trading unit, jointly owned with Swiss-based commodities trader Mercuria, could help boost government mining revenues, the minister said.
Mercuria will trade copper sourced from mines in which the government has shareholdings, Kabuswe said. Zambia prefers that its share of earnings is calculated in metal output which it can sell on its own rather than in a cash dividend, he added.
The country aims to boost copper output to about 3 million metric tons within the decade. Output dropped to about 698,000 tons in 2023, down from 763,000 tons a year earlier.
(By Pesha Magid and Felix Njini; Editing by Veronica Brown and Alexander Smith)
Reuters | January 16, 2025 |
Sentinel open-pit copper mine. (Image courtesy of First Quantum Minerals.)
Saudi Arabia’s Manara Minerals is looking for critical minerals projects in Zambia to invest in, the southern African country’s mines minister Paul Kabuswe told Reuters on Thursday.
Manara and Africa’s second-largest copper producer held talks on Wednesday after the signing the previous day of a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Saudi Arabia to cooperate on exploration for new minerals.
“They (Manara) are interested, but we do not know which ones yet,” he said on the sidelines of a mining conference in Riyadh, adding that an announcement on a potential mining deal between Zambia and Saudi Arabia is likely this year.
Saudi Arabia is among several Middle East economies pursuing deals in critical minerals, including copper and lithium, as part of de-facto ruler Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman’s strategy to wean the economy off its dependency on oil.
Manara, a joint venture between Saudi Arabian Mining Company 1211.SE and the kingdom’s $925 billion Public Investment Fund, is closing in on a deal to buy a minority stake in the Zambian copper and nickel assets of Canada’s First Quantum Minerals, Reuters reported in October.
First Quantum said on Wednesday that it is “assessing the potential benefits of a minority stake sale in Zambia”, as one of its priorities this year.
Kabuswe said while aware of the talks between Manara and First Quantum, Zambia’s government is not privy to details.
A new push by Zambia’s government to negotiate shareholdings as high as 30% in new mining projects has not impacted investor appetite, he said, although investors have had mixed feelings.
“We no longer want those agreements where we have 10% or 15%,” he said, adding that the government is also holding talks with Barrick Gold, Ivanhoe Mines and Chinese investors on their plans for new projects.
A newly-established copper trading unit, jointly owned with Swiss-based commodities trader Mercuria, could help boost government mining revenues, the minister said.
Mercuria will trade copper sourced from mines in which the government has shareholdings, Kabuswe said. Zambia prefers that its share of earnings is calculated in metal output which it can sell on its own rather than in a cash dividend, he added.
The country aims to boost copper output to about 3 million metric tons within the decade. Output dropped to about 698,000 tons in 2023, down from 763,000 tons a year earlier.
(By Pesha Magid and Felix Njini; Editing by Veronica Brown and Alexander Smith)
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