Mali gold mining revenue rose by 35% in 2022

Hummingbird Resources

19/07/2023 14:51

BAMAKO, July 19 (Reuters) - State revenue from gold
mining companies in Mali rose 35% year on year in 2022 to a
record 763.7 billion CFA francs ($1.3 billion) due to increased
tax revenues, a mines ministry official said on Wednesday.
    Mali is one of Africa's top gold producers and is home to
mining companies including Barrick Gold  ABX.TO , B2GOLD
 BTO.TO , Resolute Mining  RSG.AX  and Hummingbird Resources
 HUMR.L .
    Gold mining is a pillar of the country's economy, accounting
for about 9% of gross domestic product in 2021 and 2022 and
providing more than half of total tax revenues last year.
    Collating the full-year data habitually takes several
months.
    "The increase is mainly attributable to the great
performance of all the collection services, which are the tax
services, customs and estate services," said Mamadou Sidibe,
director of the ministry's statistics unit. 
    Mali ended several tax exemptions which also helped it raise
revenues significantly in 2021. 
    The military-led government is in talks with gold miners
over proposed changes to its mining law that could see it boost
state and private Malian interests in new projects to 35%, from
up to 20% today, according to a draft of the new code seen by
Reuters.
    Mali's industrial gold output was 66.2 tonnes in 2022,
approximately a 4% increase from the previous year. 
    ($1 = 578.7500 CFA francs)

 (Reporting by Tiemoko Diallo; Writing by Nellie Peyton; Editing
by David Holmes)
 ((nellie.peyton@thomsonreuters.com))