Africa’s second largest copper mining region – Zambia’s debt, according to reports, Zambia has about 12 billion U.S. dollars (about 84 billion Hong Kong dollars) of foreign debt, including 3 billion U.S. dollars of international bonds, as well as a large loan from China’s state-owned banks. City rumors that the government in order to repay the debt, the intention of the first major copper mining enterprises into the state, and then mortgaged to China.
Although the Zambian government did not disclose the amount of money owed to China, but according to Hopkins University China-Africa Research Initiative (China-Africa Research Initiative) estimates that Zambia has reached about $ 9.9 billion in loan arrangements with China, but not all of the loans.
Zambia became the first country in Africa to default on its sovereign debt during the epidemic when it was unable to pay $42.5 million in interest on $3 billion in U.S. dollar-denominated bonds late last year, as new pneumonia ravaged the world. In addition, in July last year, Zambia’s President Lungu (Edgar Lungu) has long asked China for debt relief, but no further information has been disclosed on how to follow up.
Zambia is Africa’s second largest copper mining region, the current high international copper prices, news that the Zambian government plans to take over copper mining enterprises to save the precarious economy. It is reported that the Zambian government first accused Mopani Copper Mines, a copper mining company owned by Canco, of suspending operations on the grounds of an epidemic, in violation of the terms of the operating permit, to revoke the company’s mining license to intimidate, and then let the state-owned mining company take over. After months of negotiations, in January, Canco announced that its subsidiary had agreed to sell its 73% interest in Mopani to state-owned mining investment company ZCCM Investments Holdings for US$1 and US$1.5 billion in debt.
However, Mopani is currently recording losses and the Zambian government is in talks with potential investors from countries such as Turkey, Canada, China and the United States. Finance ministry officials have revealed that if an investment partner is not found soon, the copper mine’s operations could be used as collateral, meaning the state-owned asset could fall into Chinese hands.
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