Chalco to invest in Guinea’s Boffa bauxite project

China’s Aluminium Corp of China (Chalco) said in an exchange filing that its Hong Kong unit will invest up to $163.8 million in the Boffa bauxite project in Guinea, which has a total cost of $706 million. The board has approved the investment and the final decision awaits shareholders’ review and approval, it said.

Guinea has been racing past many countries to become the key bauxite exporter worldwide. Guinea, China’s largest supplier of bauxite, exported 27.6 million tonnes to the country in 2017, about 40 per cent of total imports. According to Bloomberg Intelligence, China’s metal companies are stepping up overseas acquisitions “to stabilize the supply of raw materials.”

Last year, Chalco had announced its plans to spend $500 million for production of bauxite in Guinea. "The reserves of bauxite abandoned by BHP Billiton will eventually be exploited from 2018 by Chalco,” Saadou Nimaga, secretary general of the mines ministry, said earlier.

Guinea has the largest bauxite reserve in the world at 7.4 billon tonnes, the most of which is still unexplored leaving high potential for investment in the country in the bauxite sector.