means to facilitate grand corruptive deals! si muwekezaji wala mfanyabiashara..
Caspian Tanzania
MINING MADE SIMPLE
The African continent is blanketed by optimism right now, an aura that’s largely owed to the mining industry.
Mining firms spent $8.4 billion on exploring new metal deposits last year according to a study from S&P Global Marketing Intelligence, up 15 percent on 2016. Further, the report also forecast that exploration spending could rise a further 20 percent during 2019.
Combine this surge in mining pursuits with similarly buoyant M&A activities, and the stage is firmly set for Africa, the home of roughly one third of the world’s known mineral reserves, to thrive for years to come.
“Mining is a primary industry. It’s never going to go anywhere,” states Akram Aziz, the Managing Director of
Caspian Tanzania – East Africa’s premier mining contractor.
“There isn’t really one segment of our lives that isn’t touched by some form of mining. Whether it’s bauxite going into airplanes or the extraction of iron for the manufacture of automobiles, I don’t think a lot of people realise that fact.
“It’s truly an exciting, futureproofed industry.”
Indeed,
Caspian is one company that has managed to establish itself as a spearhead of this eternal sector.
Founded by the current MD’s older brother Rostam in the
mid-1980s as
Mbeya Earhmovers, the business spent much of its early life working on various rural construction projects such as road building, dam building and alike.
Owed to an emphasis on diversification, capitalisation and growth, however,
1998 marked a new, prosperous period in
Caspian’s illustrious timeline – a transition from which it hasn’t looked back.
“It was the year that
Caspian secured a contract on
De Beers’ Williamson diamond mine in northern Tanzania,” Aziz reveals. “The contract started as just a two-year deal, but we later invested in improved machinery and secured a longer-term agreement that really sparked the company’s foray into mining contracting.”
MINING MARVEL
Fast forward to the present day, and
Caspian is still working closely with De Beers’ on the Williamson mine, the companies having maintained and nurtured a fruitful, two-decade long relationship.
This project is not the sole accomplishment of the former’s mining contracting endeavours, however. Indeed,
Caspian has amalgamated an enviable portfolio since it leaped into the sector, further evidenced by its role in the development of the
Golden Pride Gold Mine.
Famed as the Tanzania’s
first modern commercial gold mine since its opening in
1999, Caspian conducted the drilling, blasting, loading and hauling functions of the Nzega District-based open pit project, providing heavy earth moving services to Australian firm Resolute Mining Limited.
In total, Golden Pride produced more than 2.2 million ounces of gold in its 15 years of operation before closing in late 2013.
Meanwhile, 2004 also saw
Caspian sign a major deal with
PANGEA Minerals Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of
Barrick Gold, to provide mining services at the
Tulawaka Gold Mine in Biharamulo in north-western Tanzania.
Operating as both an open pit and underground mine between 2005 and 2013, this site produced nearly a million ounces of gold – a figure almost double that suggested by the original feasibility study – after being brought to life by the expert capabilities of the country’s largest contractor.
“We’ve worked on the vast majority of major mines in this country,” Aziz declares. “Sometimes we’ll operate as the complete mining contractor and other times we’ll conduct major earthworks and civil works – we’re ultimately flexible in meeting the requirements of our customers.
“And I believe the reason we’ve been so successful in doing so over the years is simply because we’re Tanzanian.
“
We’re an ambitious local company with Tanzanian shareholders, a dynamic which enables us to strike the balance between having the knowledge to navigate the country’s sometimes tricky waters while simultaneously upholding the world-class standards that our customers, the likes of Barrick Gold and
AngloGold Ashanti, have come to expect.
Looking ahead, new investments will see Caspian enter a period of diversification in the coming months, the firm aiming to expand and consolidate its revenue streams in a variety of new ways.
It is currently partnered with
Yapi Merkezi, for example, a Turkish enterprise that is overseeing the construction of the Standard Gauge Railway in Tanzania – set to become the fastest railway in East Africa, stretching 1,224 kilometres to connect Uganda, Rwanda, Democratic Republic of Congo and Tanzania itself....
Read more :
Caspian Tanzania | Africa Outlook Magazine