NEW DELHI, Sept 24 (Reuters) – India’s V.V. Mineral, a beach sand miner hit by a domestic law which effectively banned private companies from extracting rare earth deposits, has applied for licenses to start operations in Kenya and Tanzania, the company’s chairman said on Tuesday.
V.V. Mineral was India’s largest exporter of rare earth minerals such as garnet, ilumenite and rutile over the last decade, but it started facing regulatory and legal trouble in 2013, which culminated in a blanket ban this year on beach sand mining by private companies.
“We have applied for two licenses to extract beach sand minerals in an area covering 300 square kilometers in Kenya, and a 15 square kilometre area in Tanzania,” S. Vaikundarajan, chairman and founder of V.V. Mineral told Reuters.
Vainkundarajan counts Australia’s GMA Garnet Pty Ltd, Rio Tinto PLC and Iluka Resource Ltd as his major competitors. Garnet is used as an abrasive, while ilumenite is used to make paints and rutile is used in the welding industry.
India accounts for over 10% of global reserves of ilumenite and rutile and has “major garnet desposits”, according to the Indian Bureau of Mines.
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