Mining - Visualizing Conflict Interest (sitios de interés)
Descripción del sitio
bauxite, alumina, diamonds, gold and uraniumRichly endowed with minerals, Guinea possesses over 25 billion metric tons (MT) of bauxite--and perhaps up to one half of the world's readily exploitable reserves.
In addition, Guinea's mineral wealth includes more than 4 billion tons of high-grade iron ore, significant diamond and gold deposits, and undetermined quantities of uranium.
Joint venture bauxite mining and alumina operations in northwest Guinea historically provided about 80% of Guinea's foreign exchange. The Compagnie des Bauxites de Guinea (CBG) is the main player in the bauxite industry. CBG is a joint venture, in which 49% of the shares are owned by the Guinean Government and 51% by an international consortium led by Alcoa and Rio Tinto-Alcan. CBG exports about 14 million MT of high-grade bauxite every year. The Compagnie des Bauxites de Kindia (CBK), a joint venture between the Government of Guinea and Russki Alumina (Rusal), produces some 2.5 million MT annually, nearly all of which is exported to Russia and Eastern Europe. Dian Dian, a Guinean/Ukrainian joint bauxite venture, has a projected production rate of 1 million MT per year, but is not expected to begin operations for several years. The Alumina Compagnie de Guinee (ACG), a subsidiary of Rusal which took over the former Friguia Consortium, produced about 2.4 million MT of bauxite in 2004, which is used as raw material for its alumina refinery. The refinery supplies about 750,000 MT of alumina for export to world markets. Both the Alcoa-Rio Tinto-Alcan consortium and the Guinea Alumina Corporation (GAC), whose stakeholders include BHP-Billiton, the Global Alumina Corporation, the Dubai Alumina Corporation, and the Mubadala Development Company, have signed conventions with the Government of Guinea to build large alumina refineries with a combined capacity of about 4 million MT per year
Diamonds and gold also are mined, though Guinea’s potential in these two industries has been historically underdeveloped By far, most diamonds are mined artisanally. The largest gold mining operation in Guinea is a joint venture between the government and Ashanti Gold Fields of Ghana. Societe Miniere de Dinguiraye (SMD) also has a large gold mining facility in Lero near the Malian border as does SEMAFO, a Canadian-based gold mining company.