Yemisi Izuora
If its initiative break even the Africa Finance Corporation (AFC) would establish a dedicated mining exploration investment company to help close Africa’s growing funding gap in mineral exploration.
The plan was announced during Africa Mining Week in Cape Town, South Africa, reflects the institution’s broader interest in a sector whose mineral resources it values at $29.5 trillion.
The initiative was presented by Franklin Edochie, AFC’s deputy director and head of Metals and Mining. It comes amid the institution’s continued efforts to strengthen its role in Africa’s mining industry, where it has already financed several gold and critical mineral projects.
According to Edochie, the new investment company is expected to become operational within the next 12 months.
Its objectives will include increasing Africa’s mineral reserves, supporting mineral production across the continent, and strengthening African control over its mineral resources.
Details about the company’s operating structure and financial resources have yet to be disclosed. However, the planned investment vehicle is expected to complement AFC’s existing portfolio of mining investments across Africa. In 2024, the Nigeria-based institution reported that it had invested more than $1 billion in precious metals and critical minerals mining across Africa since 2014.
Those investments span several countries and projects, including Nigeria’s Segilola gold mine and the Baomahun gold project in Sierra Leone, developed by FG Gold.
The Baomahun project secured a $55 million financing facility from AFC. More recently, in March 2026, the institution signed a memorandum of understanding with Nigeria’s Solid Minerals Development Fund (SMDF).
The agreement includes plans to examine financing for a proposed $1.3 billion alumina project and to carry out a comprehensive geoscientific mapping program, reports EcofinAgency.
AFC’s interest in mining is not solely driven by industrial policy objectives. Although industrial development remains central to its strategy, the institution is also a financial investor whose mandate includes generating returns for its shareholders.
On its website, AFC describes its mission as promoting economic growth and industrial development in African countries while delivering competitive investment returns to shareholders. This dual objective shapes its approach to mining projects, which can contribute to the development of the sector while also providing financial income.
AFC has approximately 40 shareholders, with 58.6% of its ownership held by public-sector investors and 41.4% by private-sector investors. Its shareholders include the Central Bank of Nigeria, which held 38.5% of the institution’s capital as of March 31, 2026, as well as private banks such as Access Bank and United Bank for Africa (UBA). The shareholder base also includes non-African institutions, such as Türk Eximbank. These investors are exposed to the financial performance of AFC’s mining investments and the income those projects may generate.
Returns can take several forms, including interest payments on loans, dividends from equity stakes in mining companies, and other financial compensation arrangements. AFC’s involvement in mining therefore combines financing for project development with opportunities to earn income from the businesses it supports. The Segilola gold mine in Nigeria illustrates this approach. AFC supported the project’s development through a financing package valued at $86 million, which combined a loan facility with a gold production-linked prepayment agreement.
In its 2024 financial statements, Thor Explorations, the Canadian company that operates Segilola, reported continued repayments on the loan. The company also recorded $4.1 million in interest expense on that borrowing during the financial year. AFC also holds an equity stake in Thor Explorations. According to information available on MarketScreener as of Thursday, October 15, the institution owned 15% of the Canadian mining company.
The Segilola investment shows how AFC can participate in a mining project’s financing through different arrangements, with returns tied to debt repayments, interest, and equity ownership. The planned exploration investment company would provide another way for AFC to support mining activities across Africa. By entering projects at the exploration stage, before mines are developed, the institution may help bring new projects forward and establish an early position in their development.
This approach reflects the scale of the opportunity identified by AFC in its Compendium of Africa’s Strategic Minerals, published in February 2026. According to the report, Africa has mineral resources valued at $29.5 trillion across its mining sites, of which approximately $8.6 trillion remains untapped.
AFC links this unrealized potential to the continent’s limited exploration activity and fragmented geological data. The proposed investment company would therefore focus on a stage of mining development where financing and geological information are particularly important to the emergence of new projects.
The initiative also comes at a time when foreign powers are showing greater interest in Africa as a source of critical minerals, particularly copper, graphite, rare earth elements, and lithium. Whether AFC can turn the proposed investment company into an operational financing vehicle remains to be seen. Beyond the financial returns it may generate for the institution and its shareholders, a key question will be how much value the initiative ultimately creates for Africa’s mining industry.