CHAMWE KAIRA
Andrada Mining CEO, Anthony Viljoen has said despite the plant outages in April the mine has successfully produced and delivered its first five-tonne consignment of tantalum from its Uis Tin Mine to during the quarter ended 31 May, with the second consignment produced and targeted for shipment in the second quarter.
The company’s assets in Namibia include the Uis Tin Mine with significant by-product potential for lithium and tantalum. The other mine is the Lithium Ridge (Nai-Nais), which is a lithium, tin and tantalum operation. The other two assets are Spodumene Hill, a lithium, tin and tantalum mine and Brandberg West, a tin, tungsten and copper mine.
“This is an important milestone for the Company, that places us firmly on the path to becoming a multi-mineral producer of critical metals. We look forward to a continuation of this supply agreement, he said.
Viljoen said given the diversity of the minerals within its mining licences, the company has broadened the scope of its strategic process beyond just the Uis mining licence.
“The expansion of the scope has the potential to unlock multiple partnership opportunities across our portfolio of assets. This process is progressing well, and we look forward to providing an update. We remain highly optimistic for the remainder of the year based on the value that will be unlocked across the portfolio,” he said.
He said the development of the lithium pilot plant paves the way for integration into the existing tin processing plant. Further assessment and modelling of the integrated plant has resulted in an increase in the planned petalite production tonnage from 30 000 tonnes per annum (tpa) to between 40 000tpa and 50 000tpa.
Approximately nine tonnes of tantalum concentrate were produced during the quarter, an increase of 14% from approximately eight tonnes produced during the previous quarter. Tantalum prices have been increasing steadily since mid-May because of the conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo which has restricted supply from selected key mining areas. Furthermore, recent increased purchasing interest from smelters is expected to support the elevated prices.
Viljoen confirmed that administrative processes related to the finalisation of the conditional N$175 million agreements between the subsidiary Uis Tin Mining Company and Bank Windhoek Limited are progressing as planned with the deal being concluded in the third quarter of this year.
He said discussions with regards to other funding options with several global lenders are ongoing with the objective to enhance the optionality on project execution.
In view of recent tin price volatility and to minimise financial risk, the company concluded a hedging instrument with Standard Bank Namibia Limited in respect of the first 20 tonnes of contained tin shipped every month in the period from June 2024 to May 2025. The price under this agreement is fixed at USD33 000 per tonne.
A tin price rally started in April due to a combination of supply tightness resulting from decreased exports from Myanmar and Indonesia as well as declining inventory in China. Speculative interest has also contributed to the rally, with experts cautioning against an excessively bullish view of future pricing. The London Metal Exchange tin spot price was US$25 450 on 2 January, increasing to above US$30 000 on 10 April and peaking at US$35 275 on 22 April. The average daily price from April to date has been approximately US$32 700, with a figure of US$30 900 applicable for the quarter.
The company’s assets in Namibia include the Uis tin mine with significant by-product potential for lithium and tantalum. The other mine is the Lithium Ridge (Nai-Nais), which is a lithium, tin and tantalum. The other two assets are Spodumene Hill, a lithium, tin and tantalum mine and Brandberg West, a tin, tungsten and copper mine.
