Mapinga Industrial Park Deal Collapses Due to Land Divergence and Financial Constraints

During a Workshop on Energy Minerals co-hosted by the Parliament of Zimbabwe and ActionAid Zimbabwe, Pfungwa Kunaka, Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Mines, declared that the Mapinga Industrial Park is effectively dead before it even got started. Kunaka cited protracted land allocations and inadequate financial capabilities as the main reasons for the collapse of the deal.

Initially, the Mapinga Industrial Park had the ambition to transform into a Mine-to-Energy Hub, by processing #CriticalMinerals into energy products. The total cost of the Project was estimated at around USD 13 billion.

Eagle Canyon partnered with Pacific Goal Investment on this mega project. Pacific Goal Investment already had mining operations in Buhera and planned to move up the value chain ladder by implementing an industrial park. The Project also included the construction of two 300-MW thermal power plants, a coking coal plant, a lithium refining plant, a graphite processing plant, a nickel-chromium smelter, and a nickel sulfate plant. An MoU between Eagle Canyon and the Government of Zimbabwe was signed back in 2022.

The investor initially requested 5,000 hectares of land right on the Great Dyke, which is known for housing huge amounts of various minerals. The site for the Industrial Park is located along the Harare to Chirundu highway, near the Gwebi River. The Government considered the request as excessive and only agreed to grant 500 hectares as a starting point.

However, the Government is still working on a similar project near the border with South Africa at Beitbridge. Xintai Resources has partnered with Tuli Coal to build the Palm River Energy and Metallurgical Industrial Park. The Park will come under the Special Economic Zone (#SEZ) to benefit from financial and fiscal incentives.