Tantalum mine ban
A mining ban in eastern Congo is preventing the tin and tantalum industry from completing an a deadline via america for “conflict minerals”.
The U.S. legislation wants Congo and its surrounding locations to show that exports have been found from conflict-free zones and routes by April next year.
“There is currently no legal mining activity to trace and the project funding, which relies on a levy on … exports, has halted,” said an emailed statement from ITRI, adding the pilot tracking scheme to track cassiterite (tin ore) from source to export now faced a $6 million shortfall.
“It is unlikely that all cassiterite from the region can be covered by the system in time and many current production areas will unfortunately as a result be subject to an effective embargo by next April.”
