Tesla and other Multinational Firms are Rushing in and Desperate To Mine Nigerian Lithium.

Buhari Says NOT Unless You Build Battery Factory Here First.

Tesla has been told it needs to double down on value addition before Nigeria will allow lithium mining. Nigeria's minister of mines is now on a mission to Australia to find lithium miners who better align with Nigerian industrial policy.

In August, Nigeria’s minister of mines and steel development, Olamilekan Adegbite, said the country had rejected Tesla Inc’s request to mine lithium, unless the company were to situate a battery-making factory in the West African nation.

He said this is to retain value along the global processing chain of lithium.

Lithium is expected to triple in demand by 2040, according to the World Bank. The price of a tonne of lithium jumped from about $6,000 in 2020 to over $78,000 in 2022.

“As for lithium, it doesn’t necessarily mean investors must produce batteries here before they can mine, but some form of industrial processing of the ore is required,” he says.....


Australian options

Although not yet public, The Africa Report has learnt that the minister of mines is currently in Australia for talks with the Australian Battery Institute. This, say ministry sources, is to show that they are ready to collaborate with countries or investors whose corporate and commercial objectives align with the ministry’s.

Australia (40,000 tonnes), Chile (20,600 tonnes) and China (14,000 tonnes) are the largest lithium miners in the world, having mined 86% of global lithium in 2020.

“Our job is to formulate policy and communicate the government’s position, but we don’t sit idly as you can see with what we are currently doing in Australia. We are optimistic,” the ministry source tells The Africa Report.

Lithium exploration and processing, if well managed, has a rich value chain that can build industries, create jobs, boost government revenue or foreign exchange and grow the economy, the government says. The federal government has identified the ore as one of the seven strategic minerals of the future...

Beyond these benefits, the government says the policy on lithium and other strategic minerals will build and sustain a pipeline of knowledge and skills. It is expected that Nigerians studying mineral processing abroad or those who learn from expatriates can transfer their skills to others, fuelling future innovation to develop the country.

“With the opportunities provided by the African Continental Free Trade Agreement [AfCFTA], Nigeria can become an emerging exporter of premium quality refined minerals to the other parts of Africa,” Chinyere Almona, the director general of the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry, says.

https://www.theafricareport.com/240607/tesla-wants-to-mine-lithium-in-nigeria-what-are-the-hidden-costs/

Wow

What happened to your hands? Are you leprous you can't mine by yourself? Why jumping here and there begging for miners and for investors? Una dey craze? What happened to una hands? You want private companies to do it so you can sit your lazy ass's and stifle them with tax but you don't want to know the pain of being investor yourselves?

Ruke1989:
What happened to your hands? Are you leprous you can't mine by yourself? Why jumping here and there begging for miners and for investors? Una dey craze? What happened to una hands? You want private companies to do it so you can sit your lazy ass's and stifle them with tax but you don't want to know the pain of being investor yourselves?

It is not the federal government's job or training to engage in the mining of minerals.

It is YOUR job, as a member of the private sector.

Nigeria is a capitalist economy, not a communist one.

Where YOU in the Nigerian private sector are lacking the capacity and/or capital etc, to engage in commercial scale mining, the government will seek investors from the world in order to build national income, industrialisation, and employment.

Good one

Quintopia:


It is not the federal government's job or training to engage in the mining of minerals.

It is YOUR job, as a member of the private sector.

Nigeria is a capitalist economy, not a communist one.

Where YOU in the Nigerian private sector are lacking the capacity and/or capital etc, to engage in commercial scale mining, the government will seek investors from the world in order to build national income, industrialisation, and employment.

stop talking like a politician, if govt can monopolize the crude oil through NNPC being sole importer, if govt can monopolize security and not allow state or private police like in the US or UK, if govt can monopolize seaport, airport construction and ownership unlike having private airports in the UK, then don't they have no excuse.
You should be educated enough to have heard about Public Private Partnership (PPP), Build Operate and Transfer (BOT) business models. If foreign investor doesn't come to mine your minerals 60 years after your birth, you politicians should not be lazy, look for any of the profitable business models above and build companies based on that. That way the private sector manages it and it will be effective.
Why can't you lazy politicians own and run business efficiently. It's because of your laziness and hatred for reforms. Govt all over the world run companies efficiently - China, Russia, Saudi, Indian, UK, German, South Africa govts, etc run companies efficiently. What makes you different is your spell bound corruption and laziness

updatechange:
Good one

Agreed.

The problem of Nigeria is not lack of local capacity but the fact that govt contracts, oil block sales provide shortcut to wealth so an average Nigerian don't want that stress since there are a lot of dubious ways to make money without stress.
Two, the govt kills every budding sector at infancy stage by being totally insensitive. There are no relief to ailing companies except that company is dangote. There is the problem of multiple taxation which makes Nigeria a bad destination for businesses. Setup a local min business today, your community youths, local govt, land owner, local traditional rulers, state govt and federal government will come like a hawk to hunt you down with different levies, taxes, fine and land tussle. They are not able to do same with illegal Chinese miners but if it's an indigene who they know, there will be problem. To secure the mining license will be problem. It will require stress, bribes, etc. That's why the govt will keep begging foreign investors to come without any success. Investors do their research very well before making investment decisions
Look at how gokada was strangled by Lagos overnight ban on okada. See how crypto firms were strangled by CBN policy. See flutterwave dollar card /batter dead because of CBN policy. Investors are wary of unstable govt policies because they kill businesses very fast after billions of dollars are invested. Investors are not fools, they study precedents. A country were ministers impose taxes at impulse and make policies at impulse without thinking thoroughly on the long term impact on companies, such country doesn't deserve investors. Telecom sectors currently pay 38 different taxes and have an additional excise tax imposed which has caused strain between the ministry of finance and the minister of communication. Policy making should be left to professionals not dumb politicians

Buhari is just like Tinubu he has nothing to offer, reject Tinubu now, reject Muslim Muslim ticket

Ruke1989:
stop talking like a politician, if govt can monopolize the crude oil through NNPC being sole importer, if govt can monopolize security and not allow state or private police like in the US or UK, if govt can monopolize seaport, airport construction and ownership unlike having private airports in the UK, then don't they have no excuse.

Use your head. That govt controls those sectors should tell you they have their hands full, and need the private sector to play its part especially in industrialisation. You don't just leave EVERYTHING to the government.

You should be educated enough to have heard about Public Private Partnership (PPP), Build Operate and Transfer (BOT) business models. If foreign investor doesn't come to mine your minerals 60 years after your birth, you politicians should not be lazy, look for any of the profitable business models above and build companies based on that. That way the private sector manages it and it will be effective.
Why can't you lazy politicians own and run business efficiently. It's because of your laziness and hatred for reforms. Govt all over the world run companies efficiently - China, Russia, Saudi, Indian, UK, German, South Africa govts, etc run companies efficiently. What makes you different is your spell bound corruption and laziness

Oh shut up and get lost. Professional finger pointer. Armchair critic.

Sit on your lazy backside doing nothing and expecting govt to do everything for your lazy self.

The UK you mentioned. Here is a list of their top mining firms. They are all privately owned. Glencore, etc.

https://miningdigital.com/top10/top-10-mining-companies-uk

USA top mining firms are all privately owned too:

https://miningdigital.com/top10/top-10-us-mining-companies

Capitalist nations figured out long ago that industrialisation is a private-sector led process, and that govt run enterprises are inherently inefficient in comparison. The trend has been to privatize industries for decades now, not the opposite as you are demanding. So instead of talking rubbish about communist ''Russia, China..'', stop waiting for govt to wipe your ass and spoon-feed you, and go out there and start your own Glencore or Amazon or Tesla or Twitter or Facebook like your mates are doing the world over.

Good one.


But the problem is that Nigeria will still remain the same if APC remains in power.

Good one

If the multi national oil companies did same thing, refineries would have be surplus in Nigeria today

Quintopia:


It is not the federal government's job or training to engage in the mining of minerals.

It is YOUR job, as a member of the private sector.

Nigeria is a capitalist economy, not a communist one.

Where YOU in the Nigerian private sector are lacking the capacity and/or capital etc, to engage in commercial scale mining, the government will seek investors from the world in order to build national income, industrialisation, and employment.

E be like say you don smoke this morning again. Whatever you are smoking, stop it before it stops you

etrouble:


E be like say you don smoke this morning again. Whatever you are smoking, stop it before it stops you

I know it sounds crazy to you, but the government is actually not responsible for everything that happens or doesn't happen in your useless life.

Nothing stops you from forming a consortium for a mining operation, using local and foreign partners and capital.

But of course, in your dull, disgruntled little head, that's the government's job. Yours is just to sit down and be collecting money at your doorstep, not to use your head and be innovative.

Mumu people.

Quintopia:


Oh shut up and get lost. Professional finger pointer. Armchair critic.

Sit on your lazy backside doing nothing and expecting govt to do everything for your lazy self.

The UK you mentioned. Here is a list of their top mining firms. They are all privately owned. Glencore, etc.

https://miningdigital.com/top10/top-10-mining-companies-uk

USA top mining firms are all private too:

https://miningdigital.com/top10/top-10-us-mining-companies

Capitalist nations figured out long ago that industrialisation is a private-sector led process, and that govt ruin enterprises are inherently inefficient in comparison. The trend has been to privatize industries for decades now, not the opposite as uou are demanding. So instead of talking rubbish about communist ''Russia, China..'', stop waiting for govt to wipe your ass and spoonfeed you, and go out there and start your own Glencore or Amazon or Tesla like your mates are doing the world over.

you are very very dumb, irrational, emotional person. Get some education here and stop being sentimental. Govt must take initiative, private sector only comes in when the right atmosphere is provided by govt. Besides, your sick head didn't know about NLNG in Nigeria - an efficiently run company, built by Public Private Partnership between Obasanjo govt and the private sector companies. The company is 100% run by the private sector. All heads are not sick like yours. If private companies don't mine your minerals after 60 years of independence and after 60 years of begging foreign investors with no result to show, then you take the initiative. You are an irresponsible person in real life that's why you are fighting hard to prove your political candidate is absolved of responsibility. Capitalism doesn't mean govt owns no company. In the US and UK govt still own manufacturing companies through public private partnership deals. They buy shares from private companies and find ways to prevent liquidation of ailing private companies. One of such way is tax exemption. Do you think you are talking to someone in your village that will be nodding his head to your distorted reasoning. You need some brain upgrade - your present brain is all emotional no sense, no reasoning ability

Ruke1989:
you are very very dumb, irrational, emotional person. Get some education here and stop being sentimental. Govt must take initiative, private sector only comes in when the right atmosphere is provided by govt. Besides, your sick head didn't know about NLNG in Nigeria - an efficiently run company, built by Public Private Partnership between Obasanjo govt and the private sector companies. The company is 100% run by the private sector. All heads are not sick like yours. If private companies don't mine your minerals after 60 years of independence and after 60 years of begging foreign investors with no result to show, then you take the initiative. You are an irresponsible person in real life that's why you are fighting hard to prove your political candidate is absolved of responsibility. Capitalism doesn't mean govt owns no company. In the US and UK govt still own manufacturing companies through public private partnership deals. They buy shares from private companies and find ways to prevent liquidation of ailing private companies. One of such way is tax exemption. Do you think you are talking to someone in your village that will be nodding his head to your distorted reasoning. You need some brain upgrade - your present brain is all emotional no sense, no reasoning ability

Lazy man. Can't you use paragraphs in your writing, or you expect the government to do that for you as well?

Why don't you shut your nasty trap and wait for the outcome of the Nigerian government's investment drive in lithium mining?

Did Tesla ask your permission before they came to Nigeria to BEG TO BE ALLOWED TO MINE LITHIUM?

Nigeria did not beg them. THEY wanted it. BUT Nigeria imposed conditions while looking for firms to partner with who meet the nation's industrial aspirations.

But that is not enough for a clown like you. You must come with your STUPID demand (which the senate will never approve) that the FG invest extra billions of dollars into a hugely capital-intensive industry, when it is struggling to maintain the ones it's already invested, from oil and gas to roads to rail and power.

Nigeria's annual national budget is just 35 billion dollars. Countries like the USA and UK whose annual budgets run into TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS have not established state-owned mining firms, but the NIGERIAN govt must use its small change to enter the world of mining. Talk about biting more than you can chew.

THANK GOODNESS YOU'RE NOT IN GOVT.

Ruke1989:
What happened to your hands? Are you leprous you can't mine by yourself? Why jumping here and there begging for miners and for investors? Una dey craze? What happened to una hands? You want private companies to do it so you can sit your lazy ass's and stifle them with tax but you don't want to know the pain of being investor yourselves?

Black people are really the most difficult to rule. See what is coming out of this black man's digital ink.

Quintopia:


Lazy man. Can't you use paragraphs in your writing, or you expect the government to do that for you as well?

Why don't you shut your nasty trap and wait for the outcome of the Nigerian government's investment drive in lithium mining?

Did Tesla ask your permission before they came to Nigeria to BEG TO BE ALLOWED TO MINE LITHIUM?

Nigeria did not beg them. THEY wanted it. BUT Nigeria imposed conditions while looking for firms to partner with who meet the nation's industrial aspirations.

But that is not enough for a clown like you. You must come with your STUPID demand (which the senate will never approve) that the FG invest extra billions of dollars into a hugely capital-intensive industry, when it is struggling to maintain the ones it's already invested, from oil and gas to roads to rail and power.

Nigeria's annual national budget is just 35 billion dollars. Countries like the USA whose annual budgets run into TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS have not established state-owned mining firms, but the NIGERIAN govt must use its small change to enter the world of mining. Talk about biting more than you can chew.

THANK GOODNESS YOU'RE NOT IN GOVT.

Some of you are so brain dead I wonder how this country can be rescued with your mentally lazy type. Someone suggested that Nigeria should have companies capable of mining these things 60 years after independence, and you're upset with him for this! Why are you mad!? Must every major source of income in this country be dictated by foreigners? You are here projecting your brand of warped capitalism, yet you can't show any examples of Nigerian companies dictating the trend in the mining industries of China, USA, Canada, Egypt, South Africa or Mexico!

Them break your hands? You can't raise your own home grown companies? You can't provide these thousands of young engineering graduates with the fund to set up related industries!? Today more than half of Nigerias gross earnings from Oil and gas, goes to western companies! Nigeria is the only major oil producing country that suffers this fate! This happened because we had/have empty headed administrative bimbos like you, who managed to access power and set the country on a wrong path with their colonial mentality!

Quintopia:
I like this new policy of the Nigerian government.

The days of foreign multinationals coming to Nigeria to just extract raw materials and go are over.

If you want our minerals you must establish serious, heavy-duty, value-addition industries here, to process the minerals here before export.

We don tire for oyinbo and their over sense.

See how as Congo dem dey suffer since King Leopold of Belgium time.

Yesterday na Leopold carry Congo dash Mobutu to chop am finish only him .

Today and tomorrow sef na Chinese dem come land Gbiiiiiii begin dey plan to export ALL resource when dey obodo Africa, go China.

Ruke1989:
What happened to your hands? Are you leprous you can't mine by yourself? Why jumping here and there begging for miners and for investors? Una dey craze? What happened to una hands? You want private companies to do it so you can sit your lazy ass's and stifle them with tax but you don't want to know the pain of being investor yourselves?

You must know that some cultures in this country have been prepared overtime by their traditional rulers to be subservient to those they consider to be superior to them. You can see how genuinely upset they are with what you said which is very frustrating. We have many unemployed geologists in this country who can be helped to set up companies and do stuff like this, but the idiots in government will prefer the white man! It can't be good if it's not the white man! The height of colonial mentality in Nigeria is at Neptune levels..

Shell Oil company owns almost all major oil and gas infastructure in Nigeria because of this mentality. As a result, Nigeria splits her Oil and gas earnings almost equally with shell on daily basis! And someone is eager to force the solid minerals sector into such arrangements again! And he's doing so while potraying himself as a patriotic capitalist!! Ask him how much investments his companies has in other countries as a capitalist hotbed and he will open his wayward mouth and close it
Ndi capitalists.

If this story is true, then that means Nigerian leaders are beginning to have sense.


Infact if I'm the president, I will tell them, whatever they mine Nigeria should never be exported as raw materia but finished product.

Mine it, turn them to batteries here and ship the finished batteries to the rest of the world.

No more exporting raw materials for scrap and importing expensive finished product.

It's madness.

Double post

Quintopia:
I like this new policy of the Nigerian government.

The days of foreign multinationals coming to Nigeria to just extract raw materials and go are over.

If you want our minerals you must establish serious, heavy-duty, value-addition industries here, to process the minerals here before export.

We don tire for oyinbo and their over sense.

Nonsense policy. Are all these raw materials the white man is extracting and giving Africans paper renewable? Why are blacks so sense? Who is the wealth going to since 500 years? Why are Africans incapable of using their own wealth or going to Asia and America to bring back raw materials?

Ruke1989:
stop talking like a politician, if govt can monopolize the crude oil through NNPC being sole importer, if govt can monopolize security and not allow state or private police like in the US or UK, if govt can monopolize seaport, airport construction and ownership unlike having private airports in the UK, then don't they have no excuse.
You should be educated enough to have heard about Public Private Partnership (PPP), Build Operate and Transfer (BOT) business models. If foreign investor doesn't come to mine your minerals 60 years after your birth, you politicians should not be lazy, look for any of the profitable business models above and build companies based on that. That way the private sector manages it and it will be effective.
Why can't you lazy politicians own and run business efficiently. It's because of your laziness and hatred for reforms. Govt all over the world run companies efficiently - China, Russia, Saudi, Indian, UK, German, South Africa govts, etc run companies efficiently. What makes you different is your spell bound corruption and laziness

how are the likes of nnpc, security etc doing compared to segment dominated fully by private investors like communications?

ScamHunter:


Nonsense policy. Are all these raw materials the white man is extracting and giving Africans paper renewable? Why are blacks so sense? Who is the wealth going to since 500 years? Why are Africans incapable of using their own wealth or going to Asia and America to bring back raw materials?

isn't that what the policy is supposed to stop?

You sabi read so?

Quintopia:


Lazy man. Can't you use paragraphs in your writing, or you expect the government to do that for you as well?

Why don't you shut your nasty trap and wait for the outcome of the Nigerian government's investment drive in lithium mining?

Did Tesla ask your permission before they came to Nigeria to BEG TO BE ALLOWED TO MINE LITHIUM?

Nigeria did not beg them. THEY wanted it. BUT Nigeria imposed conditions while looking for firms to partner with who meet the nation's industrial aspirations.

But that is not enough for a clown like you. You must come with your STUPID demand (which the senate will never approve) that the FG invest extra billions of dollars into a hugely capital-intensive industry, when it is struggling to maintain the ones it's already invested, from oil and gas to roads to rail and power.

Nigeria's annual national budget is just 35 billion dollars. Countries like the USA and UK whose annual budgets run into TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS have not established state-owned mining firms, but the NIGERIAN govt must use its small change to enter the world of mining. Talk about biting more than you can chew.

THANK GOODNESS YOU'RE NOT IN GOVT.

Please, stop replying those nitwits.

No dey stress yourself unnecessarily.

Quintopia:


Lazy man. Can't you use paragraphs in your writing, or you expect the government to do that for you as well?

Why don't you shut your nasty trap and wait for the outcome of the Nigerian government's investment drive in lithium mining?

Did Tesla ask your permission before they came to Nigeria to BEG TO BE ALLOWED TO MINE LITHIUM?

Nigeria did not beg them. THEY wanted it. BUT Nigeria imposed conditions while looking for firms to partner with who meet the nation's industrial aspirations.

But that is not enough for a clown like you. You must come with your STUPID demand (which the senate will never approve) that the FG invest extra billions of dollars into a hugely capital-intensive industry, when it is struggling to maintain the ones it's already invested, from oil and gas to roads to rail and power.

Nigeria's annual national budget is just 35 billion dollars. Countries like the USA and UK whose annual budgets run into TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS have not established state-owned mining firms, but the NIGERIAN govt must use its small change to enter the world of mining. Talk about biting more than you can chew.

THANK GOODNESS YOU'RE NOT IN GOVT.

Regarding the bolded part of your submission above, I have always felt that the tedious task of breaking my stream-of-thought writing into paragraphs ought to be something that I could assign to our local government chairman's secretary in my village as a normal part of their responsible governance with a human face. Visit our local government secretariat any time of the day, and you will SEE that civil servants are blessed with ABUNDANT free time to handle such basic civil duties as paragraph insertion for their loyal constituents.

After all, I pay tax, I pay abgeros, I pay kidnappers, I pay the police, and I pay electricity workers to let me use my neighbor's generator when there is no light in our area for 3 months, while I also pay the cable man to connect me with free Awoof TV from next door. All these normal responsibilities that I religiously fulfill without complaint must be considered against the backdrop of the local government chairman suddenly commissioning several huge personal mansion building projects in his village the week after entering office.

It is not too much to ask for a law-abiding tax-paying citizen of Obodo Nigeria, that paragraph indentation, spelling checks, and other mundane but necessary aspects of writing here in the Nairaland forum, MUST HENCEFORTH become the responsibility of the local or state government. The right to demand editing services from the government must never be infringed upon by enemies of progress in Nigeria.

If the government is not willing to repair the tarred road to its own administrative secretariat, then at the very least I DEMAND that they correct my writing at all times day or night on demand. Damn! It's not like I'm asking for electricity to reach my house during my lifetime, or lobbying for motorable roads to be created for the public. Paragraphs, Mr. President, the people DEMAND paragraphs and nothing less.


With that burden off my chest by way of a good old rant, I agree with the idea of having our planet's richest man Elon Musk create employment and boost the economy INSIDE NIGERIA with a Tesla battery factory investment in Nigeria, as a qualifying prerequisite for Tesla's securing of exclusive mining rights to Nigeria's lithium reserves. Tesla could prove to be one of Nigeria's most lucrative corporate partnerships and would be a MUCH better and safer alternative than allowing the Chinese anywhere near those lithium treasures lying abundant beneath Nigeran soils.

God bless Sambisa Forest! God bless The Village Baale!

ribbit:
how are the likes of nnpc, security etc doing compared to segment dominated fully by private investors like communications?

He's not even talking about just government companies, he is also talking about building up indigenous private companies to play serious roles in these areas in other to create jobs, domesticate technology and retain earnings! This is so easy to grasp but you guys are making it look like rocket science! MTN is not a South African government company. It's an indigenous South African private company dominating the telecom business in Nigeria. South Africa propped up that company to world standards. Today it's competing seriously on the international stage.

Are you guys saying that Nigerians and Nigerian companies are inherently incapable of such? Is that not the height of inferiority complex? Instead of deliberately auctioning off Nigerias mineral assets to unconcerned foreigners at every turn, why not empower local players to be more active in these areas? Is there any example of a major economy that has been developed totally by outsiders? Do you know that MTN ships out billions of dollars in this country on yearly basis? Do you know that capital flight is part of the reason for forex scarcity in Nigeria? How can you control your economy to serve your people if all the major players are foreigners, from banks to telecom to mining?

Unfortunately, Tesla doesn't operate this way. Tesla will not build a battery plant anywhere in the world without a nearby electric vehicle plant. Tesla Neveda is a case in point. That's the only way Tesla manages supply chain and achieves a significant cost-saving.

For Tesla to build a battery factory in your country, they will also have to build a Tesla Gigafactory plant like the one in China, California, and Berlin (Germany). Even Panasonic (Tesla's major battery supplier) had to move its plant to Tesla auto plant. So those who are optimistic about this news should please kill their optimism immediately.

Tesla is not coming to build a factory in Nigeria not now, not in the foreseeable future. Its most recent factory (the fourth) in Germany attracted a lot of contests. Presidents of European nations were literally "fighting" to have one. These are people who care about climate change and all that...and can afford a Tesla. There's no competitive or comparative advantage for Tesla to have a battery plant in Nigeria.

Responsible local/ private entities should take over and channel our resources effectively. We are not giving our resources to anybody to mine.

Buhari should please leave lithium mining alone and anything to do with high radioactive materials biko!!! Ordinary oil spill we never control finish na radioactive waste.