Mali has begun building a 200-tonne-a-year gold refinery outside Bamako, the first major project under the military government’s push to process the country’s bullion domestically.
The plant, launched Monday in partnership with Russia’s Yadran Group and a Swiss investment firm, will give Mali a controlling stake and, once complete, the capacity to handle nearly four times the nation’s current annual output.
Interim President Colonel Assimi Goïta said forcing miners to refine gold in-country will capture revenue long lost to foreign facilities in the UAE, South Africa and Switzerland. “This deprives our country of substantial income needed for development,” he told the groundbreaking ceremony in Sénou.
The move echoes revised mining codes across the Sahel—Guinea, Niger and Burkina Faso have adopted similar mandates—to boost local value-addition.
No completion date was announced, but Yadran chief Irek Salikhov said the site aims to serve as a regional hub, processing gold from neighbouring producers such as Burkina Faso.
Since seizing power in 2021 and pivoting away from Western partners, Goïta has overhauled Mali’s mining regime, unsettling investors. Earlier this month a Malian court placed Barrick Gold’s Loulo-Gounkoto mine under temporary state control amid a tax dispute.
Officials say the refinery will tighten oversight of production and curb the billions lost annually to illicit gold smuggling in West Africa.
