Zambia has emerged with the biggest number of pre-selected projects due to mining investors presentation at the Mines 2006 indaba it hosts this month, The Post reported Tuesday.

Mines 2006 is an initiative stemming from a 1994 agreement between the European Union (EU) and the Southern African Development Community (SADC) countries to promote investment in the region.

Preliminary data for the conference held under the EU-SADC investment partnership program (ESIPP) shows that Zambia, Tanzania, Malawi and Zimbabwe have the majority of projects under consideration, while South Africa, the mining giant of the region, has only two projects in the bulk minerals and diamond categories.

Totally, Zambia, Tanzania and Malawi have a total of 69 projects, which predominantly fall into the precious-metal and base-metal categories while Zambia has 37 projects, a reflection of intense interest in the country's mining sector.

The country has 17 projects in the base metals category under consideration with the remainder being the precious metals category.

At the conference, which will facilitate the discussion of project proposal and negotiation of partnership agreements, 101 new and high-quality business development projects in the mining sectors of the region will be presented to European, African, Canadian and Australian investors.

From a world production perspective, the SADC region contributes about 72 percent of platinum-group metals, 55 percent of diamond, 46 percent of vanadium, 40 percent of chromate, 26 percent of gold, 15 percent of manganese and eight percent of copper.

Mines 2006 is the fourth in a series of sector partnership meetings.

Source: Xinhua