{"id":6771,"date":"2026-01-06T08:54:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-06T08:54:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/6771\/"},"modified":"2026-01-06T08:54:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-06T08:54:09","slug":"huayou-to-start-zimbabwe-lithium-sulphate-production-early-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/6771\/","title":{"rendered":"Huayou to start Zimbabwe lithium sulphate production early 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

HARARE, Oct 17 (Reuters) – China’s Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt (603799.SS), opens new tab<\/a> will start producing lithium sulphate during the first quarter of 2026 from its new $400 million plant in Zimbabwe, the company said on Thursday, as the African country pushes for more local processing.<\/p>\n

The newly completed plant at Huayou’s wholly owned Prospect Lithium Zimbabwe’s Arcadia mine has capacity to exceed 50,000 metric tons of lithium sulphate annually, an executive said during a tour of the operation.<\/p>\n

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Lithium sulphate is an intermediate product which can be refined into a battery-grade material such as lithium hydroxide or lithium carbonate used in battery manufacturing.<\/p>\n

“We will start the first production from the beginning of next year,” Prospect Lithium Zimbabwe general manager Henry Zhu told reporters.<\/p>\n

“The quantity of the lithium sulphate should be more than 60,000 metric tons, but it will depend on the configuration of the plant, because it is brand new,” Zhu added.<\/p>\n

Zimbabwe, Africa’s top lithium producer, has been nudging miners to process the mineral in the country in order to help lift its economy.<\/p>\n

Huayou, which acquired Arcadia lithium mine for $422 million in 2022, commissioned a $300 million lithium concentrator in 2023.<\/p>\n

The company and other Chinese metals firms Sinomine (002738.SZ), opens new tab<\/a>, Chengxin Lithium Group (002240.SZ), opens new tab<\/a>, Yahua Group (002497.SZ), opens new tab<\/a>, and Tsingshan Holding dominate Zimbabwe’s lithium mining, producing concentrates and shipping them to their home country.<\/p>\n

Huayou exported 400,000 tons of lithium concentrate from Zimbabwe in 2024.<\/p>\n

The southern African country will ban<\/a> the export of lithium concentrates from 2027 as it pushes for more local processing.<\/p>\n

Sinomine has also announced plans to build a $500 million lithium sulphate plant at its Bikita mine in Zimbabwe.<\/p>\n

Reporting by Chris Takudzwa Muronzi, editing by Nelson Banya and Lincoln Feast.<\/p>\n

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab<\/a><\/p>\n

Purchase Licensing Rights<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HARARE, Oct 17 (Reuters) – China’s Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt (603799.SS), opens new tab will start producing lithium sulphate…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6772,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[60],"tags":[488,2096,4590,1877,3859,1762,4893,1597,4886,4887,715,492,4892,491,493,714,4888,4889,4890,1881,1882,1883,1884,2528,1405,4891,1766,2524,106,2533],"class_list":{"0":"post-6771","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-zimbabwe","8":"tag-afr","9":"tag-asia","10":"tag-asxpac","11":"tag-bmat","12":"tag-chem","13":"tag-cmpny","14":"tag-cn","15":"tag-com","16":"tag-comc","17":"tag-comc1","18":"tag-destozabsm","19":"tag-eafr","20":"tag-easia","21":"tag-emea","22":"tag-emrg","23":"tag-fin","24":"tag-lith","25":"tag-memi","26":"tag-memi1","27":"tag-metl","28":"tag-min","29":"tag-mine","30":"tag-minmtl","31":"tag-mtal","32":"tag-mtpix","33":"tag-nferpr","34":"tag-publ","35":"tag-topicmarkets-commodities-metals","36":"tag-zimbabwe","37":"tag-zw"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6771","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6771"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6771\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6772"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6771"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6771"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6771"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}