WASHINGTON: A ban on gold and copper exports from Tanzania is costing Acacia Mining more than $1m a day in lost revenues, and the company may soon be unable to continue normal production, it said today. Shares in the London-listed miner, which is majority owned by Barrick Gold, dropped by 13 per cent in a day when the Tanzanian government unexpectedly announced the policy earlier this month.
The east African country’s government wants to ensure that raw materials produced in the country are also processed there. Acacia said it has offered to work with the government to support a new study into the possibility of building a smelter to process its concentrate in the country. The company’s two mines in Tanzania provide around a third of its total revenues. Acacia said today that the mines are currently operating as normal and it has enough capacity to store the concentrate it is producing on site “beyond the end of April”. However, it added that if the ban remains in place next month, it will have to “reassess how long we can continue to produce as normal”.
