London — Mining regulators in the Democratic Republic of Congo have said that the country will allow cobalt shipment under the quotas for the ‘last three months of 2020 to be made until the end of March. This is because the preparations for the new quota system take a long time. Analysts estimate that Congo accounted for 70% of the global cobalt mined production, which was around 280,000 tons in this year. A’months-long ban on exports’ drove up cobalt prices and impacted the availability of ‘the metal required for electric vehicles.
The system launched on 16 October has allocated a quota for the fourth quarter of 18,125 tons and will cap exports at 96,600 tonnes per year from 2026.
The regulator ARECOMS said that quotas from October 16 to December 31 will “remain valid” until March 31, according to a statement dated on Sunday.
CMOC, and Glencore are the two world’s largest cobalt producers. CMOC has a quota of 6,650 tons for the fourth quarter, while Glencore only gets 3,925 tons. This month, it was reported that Glencore will be the first miner testing the system – and that Congolese officials have also started collecting samples to prepare for CMOC’s earliest cobalt shipment.
Loading, customs payments and final authorisation are also steps before shipments leave.
In its statement ‘this week’, ARECOMS said that it would also examine any requests for modification of allocated quotas – without specifying if they had received any.
The company has never given a date when it would complete the preparations to implement its quota-based system. (Reporting and writing by Ange Adihe Kazongo, Robbie Corey Boulet, editing by Barbara Lewis).
