LUANDA (Reuters)- –De Beers signed two mineral investment contracts with the Angolan government on Wednesday, the Anglo American (LON:AAL) affiliate said, marking the company’s return to the southern African nation from which it departed in 2012.
They are 35 years long and give De Beers the right to look for diamonds and mine them through two new joint ventures with Angola’s national diamond business, Endiama.
In the new joint ventures, De Beers will own 90% of them, and Endiama will own 10% at first, but it could get more over time. Angola’s oil and natural resources minister Diamantino Azevedo said at a ceremony in the capital, Luanda.
Azevedo added, “The return of De Beers to Angola is a watershed event for the nation and the world mining industry.”
Between 2005 to 2012, De Beers investigated diamonds in Angola but determined that a stand-alone deposit in the region was not economically viable and abandoned its concession.
According to Kimberley Process figures, Angola was the world’s seventh-largest producer of rough diamonds in 2020. Russia, the world’s biggest diamond producer, has been hit with sanctions from the West. This could make people want to buy diamonds from other places.
De Beers anticipates commencing exploratory efforts on the licences later this year. In December of last year, the company said that it had asked for permission to do exploratory work in the country.
“Angola has worked diligently in recent years to establish a secure and attractive investment climate, and we are thrilled to resume active exploration in the nation,” De Beers CEO Bruce Cleaver said in a statement.
Angola applied earlier this month to join the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, an organisation that compiles public data on government earnings from mining and oil.
