Barrick Gold are bullish on the outlook for gold and copper in Africa, according to its President and chief executive Mark Bristow.
This comes as the mining house has identified new growth opportunities at its Kibali mine in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) that will support a ten-year business plan establishing the mine as one of Barrick’s Tier One assets.
“Kibali is a highly cost-efficient operation with its three world-class hydropower stations supplying much of its energy requirements. They will be supplemented by a new 17MW solar plant which, when completed in 2025, will raise the renewable component of the mine’s energy mix from 81% to 93%,” Bristow said.
He said Kibali’s prolific orebody continued to deliver additional value while current drilling was focused on converting resources into reserves. “We are also continuing to explore further deposits. In addition, targets in the Mengu Hill, Ikanva and Gorumbwa are showing the potential for joining Kibali’s underground portfolio."
Bristow said over and above investments in the gold sector the mining house was also growing its copper portfolio to support the transition to clean energy and infrastructure development.
“No one could have predicted how 2022 would turn out. Deteriorating geopolitics brought fundamental changes to the global financial landscape heralding the end of easy money. We now face a new regime of high-interest rates, inflation and volatility.”
On the positive, said Bristow, was the increasing realisation of the importance of mining to the rest of the world and the growing importance of African mining in this regard.
“Gold was one of the better-performing assets in 2022 and the copper price picked up well. Strategically copper is an important commodity to our business and we will continue to invest in projects. At the moment we own some of the world’s best gold assets and we continue to look for more. Growing our gold and copper portfolio remains the strategy.”
This boded well for the African project sector, he said. “Our value foundation as a business lies in North America but it is in Africa and the Middle East where we are seeing unprecedented growth.”
Calling for more partnership and collaboration Bristow said it was only by working together that stakeholders across the supply chain would be able to unlock the value of the mineral endowment to the benefit of all involved.
