Blantyre, Malawi: Potential Opportunities for Investors - Millennium ...

Rate of discovery
Rate of discoveries of new deposits
has not been encouraging. Discoveries
in 2005 and 2006 lead to a rise in the
number of prospecting licenses from 10
in 2006 to 39 in 2007 and 38 in 2008.
But subsequent discoveries have not
been as encouraging; only two mining
licenses were issued in 2008.
The low rate of discoveries has been
attributed to inferior geological data.
The Department of Geological Surveys
has conducted full surveys of Malawi
in 1981. These are typically of the scale
1:100,000 and 1:50,000.
However, a full geological mapping
of a scale 1:25,000 using the latest
global positioning systems has still
not been conducted.
Mining licences by type
Units
45
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
05
10
08
10
Blantyre, Malawi: Potential Opportunities for Investment 46
07
09
50
GPS survey
The Malawian government has
invited investment into a GPS based
geological survey which is expected to
significantly improve the knowledge of
Malawi’s mineral resources. The World
Bank and the UK government have
been invited to invest in this initiative.
This survey could reduce the risk for
investors prospecting mineral deposits
in Malawi.
“The government expects interested
mining companies to invest in
improving the quality of the geological
data in Malawi”, Department of
Mines, Malawi
Number of exclusive prospecting licences issued
Number of mining licences issued
0.0 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009
Source:
Department of Mines, Government of Malawi
Department of Geological Surveys
39
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13
38
02
05
00