Mining Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the Earth, usually from an ore body, lode, vein, seam, reef, or placer deposit. The exploitation of these deposits for raw material is based on the economic via ...

Guinea-Bissau Guinea-Bissau ( ; pt, Guiné-Bissau; ff, italic=no, 𞤘𞤭𞤲𞤫 𞤄𞤭𞤧𞤢𞥄𞤱𞤮, Gine-Bisaawo, script=Adlm; Mandinka: ''Gine-Bisawo''), officially the Republic of Guinea-Bissau ( pt, República da Guiné-Bissau, links=no ) ...

is limited to small-scale production of construction materials, such as

clay Clay is a type of fine-grained natural soil material containing clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4). Clays develop plasticity when wet, due to a molecular film of water surrounding the clay par ...

granite Granite () is a coarse-grained (phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies undergro ...

limestone Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms whe ...

, and sand and gravel.Omayra Bermúdez-Lugo
"The Mineral Industries of The Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, and Senegal"
''2005

Minerals Yearbook The ''Minerals Yearbook'' is an annual publication from the United States Geological Survey. It reviews the mineral In geology and mineralogy, a mineral or mineral species is, broadly speaking, a solid chemical compound with a fairly well-def ...

''.

U.S. Geological Survey The United States Geological Survey (USGS), formerly simply known as the Geological Survey, is a scientific agency of the United States government. The scientists of the USGS study the landscape of the United States, its natural resources, and ...

(August 2007). ''This article incorporates text from this U.S. government source, which is in the

public domain The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work A creative work is a manifestation of creative effort including fine artwork (sculpture, paintings, drawing, sketching, performance art), dance, writing (literature), filmmaking, ...

''. The country's prospective minerals include

bauxite Bauxite is a sedimentary rock with a relatively high aluminium content. It is the world's main source of aluminium and gallium. Bauxite consists mostly of the aluminium minerals gibbsite (Al(OH)3), boehmite (γ-AlO(OH)) and diaspore (α-AlO(O ...

diamond Diamond is a Allotropes of carbon, solid form of the element carbon with its atoms arranged in a crystal structure called diamond cubic. Another solid form of carbon known as graphite is the Chemical stability, chemically stable form of car ...

gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile met ...

heavy minerals In geology, a heavy mineral is a mineral with a density that is greater than 2.9 g/cm3, most commonly referring to dense components of siliciclastic sediments. A heavy mineral suite is the relative percentages of heavy minerals in a stone. Heavy min ...

petroleum Petroleum, also known as crude oil, or simply oil, is a naturally occurring yellowish-black liquid mixture of mainly hydrocarbons, and is found in geological formations. The name ''petroleum'' covers both naturally occurring unprocessed crud ...

, and

phosphate rock Phosphorite, phosphate rock or rock phosphate is a non-detrital sedimentary rock that contains high amounts of phosphate minerals. The phosphate content of phosphorite (or grade of phosphate rock) varies greatly, from 4% to 20% phosphorus pentoxi ...

Phosphate

Phosphate In chemistry, a phosphate is an anion, salt, functional group or ester derived from a phosphoric acid. It most commonly means orthophosphate, a derivative of orthophosphoric acid . The phosphate or orthophosphate ion is derived from phospho ...

deposits were identified about 40 years ago in the region of

Farim Farim is a town of northern Guinea-Bissau. It sits on the north bank of the Farim/Cacheu River, about 215 km (135 miles) up the river from Cacheu. Population 8,661 (2009 census). The Farim phosphate rock deposit had estimated resources of more than 166 Mt at a grade of 29% P₄O₁₀.

Red Back Mining Red Back Mining Inc. is an unhedged Vancouver based mineral resource company. Its focus is West Africa where it operates the Chirano Gold Project in Ghana and the Tasiast Gold Mine in Mauritania. It has one division, Red Back Mining NL, based in ...

Inc. through its

subsidiary A subsidiary, subsidiary company or daughter company is a company owned or controlled by another company, which is called the parent company or holding company. Two or more subsidiaries that either belong to the same parent company or having a s ...

Champion Industrial Minerals (CIM) held a mining lease and after completing a technical and market evaluation in 2003, the company concluded that the project had advanced to a stage where it required a level of developmental, operational, and marketing expertise that was beyond CIM's capacity; since that time, the company has attempted to either locate a suitable partner to develop the Farim deposit or to sell it. Over the past 10 years, licences changed hands between companies for reasons similar to those advanced by CIM, i.e. technical inability to perform required work. More recently, the licence has been held by GB Minerals which signed in 2009 a production agreement with the Guinea-Bissau government.

Bauxite

Bauxite Bauxite is a sedimentary rock with a relatively high aluminium content. It is the world's main source of aluminium and gallium. Bauxite consists mostly of the aluminium minerals gibbsite (Al(OH)3), boehmite (γ-AlO(OH)) and diaspore (α-AlO(O ...

deposits have been identified near the city of Boé since the 1950s. At the time they were never commercially viable due to low world prices. As the economic prospects have become more enticing in the past decaden a lease was granted to a firm named Bauxite Angola in 2007, which has recently made announcements of investments of up to US$500 million.

References

{{Africa topic, Mining in

Economy of Guinea-Bissau