The Qatar Investment Authority announced on Wednesday a $500 million investment in Canadian company Ivanhoe Mines, which develops mining projects in sub-Saharan Africa.
The Gulf state’s sovereign wealth fund will own roughly four percent of Ivanhoe Mines following the completion of the investment, the QIA said in a statement.
The Qatari fund’s chief executive Mohammed Saif Al-Sowaidi said the investment would support Ivanhoe “in finding, developing, and sustainably supplying the critical minerals essential to the global energy transition and advanced technology”.
Ivanhoe Mines executive Robert Friedland said the investment was an endorsement of the firm’s push to “be a leading supplier of critical metals that will drive the electrification of the global economy, development of new energy infrastructure, and growth of advanced technologies” including AI.
Vancouver-based Ivanhoe Mines’ main projects are its Kamoa-Kakula copper mine and the Kipushi zinc-copper mine in the Democratic Republic of Congo, in addition to the Platreef mine in South Africa which is set to start production in 2025.
The Canadian firm is also conducting copper exploration projects in DR Congo, Angola, Zambia and Kazakhstan.
