Altona to raise £500,000 for Africa REEs

Mining exploration company, Altona Energy plc, is looking to raise up to £500,000 for its new strategic focus on rare earth elements (REEs) in East Africa.

The company has signed heads of agreements with two African mining companies, to acquire a majority stake in two REE projects, one in Malawi and the second in Uganda.

Altona is also in advanced negotiations with two other African REE mining projects in respect of acquiring majority stakes.

The company began its new strategy focus in early 2020, and in May 2020 entered into an MoU with a Malawian mining consultancy company, Akatswiri Mineral Resources, for the acquisition of 75% of a REE mining asset in Southern Malawi.

In July, a heads of agreement was signed with Akatswiri with the intention of completing the acquisition once funding was in place.

The exploration licence (APL 0153) is awaiting approval by the Malawi Government, which is expected by mid-October.

Altona Energy has also signed a non-binding agreement to acquire a 70% stake in the Nankoma REE project in Uganda from Leadway Group Ltd.

The associated tenement covers 67.5 sq km and lies some 50km east of Jinja and 130km east of Kampala in Eastern Uganda.

Altona has already carried out some extensive exploration work and the company only needs to conduct limited exploratory test drilling and core sampling to establish whether further funds are required to produce a full resource estimate at each site next year.

Interim CEO of Altona, Christian Taylor-Wilkinson, said: “Although still early days for our new strategy, the board is confident it has found the right sector and most suitable projects to begin delivering positive results to shareholders.”

Altona aims to build a multi-asset portfolio of REE mining projects in Eastern and Central Africa and believes that the ionic clay REE deposits in the East African Rift System are an ideal target for exploration.

The company hopes to spread its risk between low grade / low operating cost ionic-clay type deposits and the high grade and high operating costs carbonatite deposits by acquiring REE assets of differing geological natures.