Presence of minerals in Sudan
Sudan’s topography varies from desert lands, hills, and scattered volcanic mountains to valleys. This diversity of terrain has led to a diversity of mineral presence. The Red Sea region in northeastern Sudan contains copper, gold, iron ore, silver, and zinc, as well as black sand, agate, gypsum, salt, and talc. As for the Bayuda Desert, which is located in north-central Sudan, it contains deposits of feldspar, gold, iron, aluminum silicates, manganese, marble and mica. The volcanic Jebel Marra, located in western Sudan, hosts deposits of base minerals, garnet, aluminum silicate, salt and sulfur.
The Jabal Abyad and Jabal Wahib areas north of Wadi Hawar have the potential to produce bauxite, chromite, gold and platinum minerals. As for the Anqasna region, located in Blue Nile State in southeastern Sudan, it contains asbestos, chromite, gold, magnesium, marble, and talc. The Nuba Mountains located in South Kordofan host important mineral ores such as chromium, copper, gold, iron, manganese, nickel, and industrial minerals such as graphite, marble, phosphate rocks, talc, and uranium as energy minerals. The Hafrat al-Nahhas area, located in South Darfur State in southwestern Sudan, contains copper, gold, precious stones and uranium.
This narration of the most important areas in Sudan that contain minerals shows that Sudan abounds in a huge amount of them, but on the other hand, anyone looking at the situation of Sudan in terms of producing and benefiting from these minerals sees a clear deficiency in directing the industry towards them, so how can the correct process of exploiting them be carried out? Before talking about how to benefit from these minerals, we must talk about some of the threats to these resources that face this entire sector and which need to be given attention. We are working to solve this matter by using modern technology, safe use of the environment, encouraging investment and providing opportunities, especially in metals that are exported in raw form and are not processed, and striving to develop plans to provide factories to process them locally so that their economic returns are feasible.
Sudan ranks thirteenth in the world and third in Africa in gold production, producing about 80 tons, while untapped reserves are estimated at about 1,550 tons.
Gold represents half of Sudan’s exports, and export revenues in the first half of last year amounted to $1.3 billion, noting that the proportion of smuggled gold amounts to about 80% of production. Therefore, this estimate is lower than the real output.
