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SMB-Winning Consortium lays the foundation stone for the Simandou project service port

Tuesday October 6, 2020, Morebaya –
SMB-Winning Consortium laid the foundation stone for a new ore port built by the Consortium as part of the Simandou Project. To enable this event to take place, a health protocol has been put in place by the HSSE department in collaboration with the National Health Security Agency (ANSS) in order to guarantee barrier measures, limited number of people invited, all being tested prior to the event, social distancing, and of course supply of gels and masks.
The ceremony took place in attendance of a large part of the management of the SMB-Winning Consortium including Mr. Sun Xiushun, Chairman and CEO of the Consortium, Mr. Frédéric Bouzigues, CEO of the SMB and Mr. Ismael Diakité, Director Deputy General of the SMB. Also present were Mr. Ahmed Keita, the representative of the Minister of Mines and Geology and chief of staff of the said ministry were also present, as well as the local authorities, notably Mr. Moustapha Touré, sub-prefect of Maferinyah. With high-grade ore reserves estimated at over 2 billion tonnes, Simandou is considered the largest untapped iron deposit in the world.
As the Simandou deposit is located in the mountainous areas of forest Guinea nearly 700 kilometers from the Guinean coast, its exploitation is a mining as well as a logistical challenge involving the construction of a railroad of over 679 kilometers as well as a mineral port in south of Conakry near the locality of Morebaya.
The mining concession agreement was signed in June 2020 between the Guinean government and the SMB-Winning Consortium. Bringing together companies with strong experience in the field of logistics and mining within the SMB Winning Consortium in the field of logistics and mining, the company in charge of the project, Winning Consortium Simandou (WCS), intends to reproduce the successful development model set in place in the exploitation of bauxite in Boké: logistics expertise, promotion of qualified and local employment, demanding and ambitious CSR policy.
“The laying of this foundation stone symbolizes a new stage in the development of the infrastructure carried out by the Consortium,” said Mr. Sun Xiushun, CEO of SMB-Winning Consortium. “It also embodies the Consortium’s desire to respect the Simandou project schedule in order to be able to develop these deposits, while respecting the health instructions related to the Covid-19 crisis. The project in its initial phase will provide the terminal of the maritime transport route arrival destination of the maritime transport route of material and equipment for the construction of the mining and railway infrastructure of the Simandou mine.
In the near future, this port will provide an opening to the world for the transport of mining and agricultural resources from Guinea. In the long term, it will be able to transform itself into a diversified and modern free trade port which will contribute to the economic growth of the region ”