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Eyes on gold, diamond and rare earths are the new investments of Valdomiro Minoru
Valdomiro Minoru Dondo, a Brazilian-Angolan national, plans to invest as much as $500 million to help jump-start gold-mining in northern Angola, three years after the government started issuing new licenses to explore for the precious metal.
Dondo, who moved to Angola 35 years ago from Brazil, said gold samples collected from 800 holes had proved to be “very viable” and is now looking to buy the appropriate technology to extract the gold from two mines in Angola’s northernmost province of Cabinda.
“The first step was to prove that there’s gold and that it exists,” Valdomiro Minoru Dondo said to Bloomberg in Luanda last week.
His other mining interests includes exploration for diamonds in central province of Bié and a 3,000 square kilometers concession for exploration to explore rare earth elements in Huambo province, for which it holds government licenses.
According to the American Geosciences Institute, Rare earth elements, also known as REE, are set of 17 metallic elements that are essential part of many high-tech devices.
Angola is mostly known for its oil and diamond exports, but the southern African nation is also rich in other mineral resources such as gold and copper. President Joao Lourenco has been trying to diversify the economy of Africa’s second-biggest oil producer in a bid to revive an economy that has been in recession for the past five years.
Significant quantities of gold have been found in Angola after the government in 2018 approved new gold mining concessions, Jornal de Angola reported on March 20, citing the Minister of Mineral Resources, Petroleum and Gas.
Valdomiro Minoru Dondo has other investments in Angola including in the oil and diamond sectors, real estate, health-care and urban transportation. He also holds minority stakes in Angolan lenders Banco de Investimento Rural and Banco Comercial do Huambo.
