Eastport Ventures: Mining in Botswana for Electrification

Burns Singh Tennent-Bhohi is the founder and CEO of Eastport Ventures, a company that's been developed over the last six or seven years with a focus on identifying advanced stage mineral exploration projects in the country of Botswana.
He sat down with Sustainability Magazine to explore mining, Eastport Ventures, Botswana and the relationship between mining and sustainability.
Why is mining important in the race to net zero?
The world is on a track to electrification to achieve global decarbonisation – and electrification requires critical minerals.
“It's about trying to reverse 150 years of how we've consumed energy into something that's now completely different,” Burns explains. “It requires dependency on a completely different form of raw material. And because mining remains historically, and to this day, a highly undercapitalised and under-allocated industry sector that's very disliked the world over, we're in a position now where these commodities are effectively critical to achieving energy ambitions.”
As the transition away from fossil fuels develops, the demand for critical minerals increases. However, it isn’t as easy as plucking things from the earth.
“The time it takes to actually take a mineral project from the point of discovery to production means that there's a huge gap in terms of the objectives that the world has to try and reduce dependency on dirty fuels and convert to something in the form of electrification,” Burns continues.
“That electrification story does not happen without the contribution of mining companies.
“I think a lot of people still struggle to understand that kind of symbiotic relationship that quite literally we're not going to be able to meet these objectives unless there's a lot more focus on how we can securely achieve supply of raw materials in an ethical way.”
About Eastport Ventures
The company has a total of six projects covering a suite of commodities including copper, nickel, uranium and rare earth elements.
“The consistent theme that we've taken in acquiring and assembling these six projects is making sure that they have a real opportunity to reach a material stage in their development curve,” Burns says. “The consistent narrative on each acquisition we’ve made is ensuring that they either sit next to an operating line or they're adjacent to an existing body that has a great opportunity to reach a stage of commercial production in the future.”
Burns believes that a key element to the success of Eastport Ventures is the dedicated team behind the scenes.
“From our local team and employees all the way through to our board of directors, we are fully aligned – there is not a single person within the company, for example, that hasn't invested their own capital in the business.”
Investing in critical minerals in Botswana
Eastport Ventures has chosen Botswana as its hub.
“When people think of Botswana and the mining industry side by side, it's most prolific for diamond production," states Burns.
“But when you actually look deeper into the country and the opportunities that were available in that space, you just have to cast your eye over the last 10 years and see in a very challenging market environment, some of the largest corporate transactions and mines actually coming online and being commissioned for production have all happened in this small country.
“So what it indicates to me very early on is that there's a quite considerable disconnect in terms of the level of opportunity that the country offers for foreign direct investment purposes.
“Over the last 10 years we've conducted business all around the world in this industry, but Botswana has consistently delivered us our greatest returns commercially.
“We've established longstanding relationships, infrastructure, local employees, connections, relationships in the country. And so for me, Eastport Ventures was born out of a desire to build a business from the ground up.
“I've been involved in Botswana for close to 10 years in corporate transactions, but I was always getting involved at a later stage of the process. So in 2019 we set out on this journey to build a business from the ground up, take our time, be patient and build sort of a very robust select group of assets that we would prepare carefully and in anticipation of a more supportive market in the future.”
The Fraser Institute ranks Botswana as number one in Africa and top 10 in the world globally in the policy and perception index, which also strengthens a lot of contribution and involvement in foreign direct investment initiatives for the country.
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