Tuesday Update – DR Congo

PLEASE don’t adjust the brightness settings on your screen, this update really is off the scale in terms of the colour of its minerals. This can really only mean one thing – the DRC.

The Democratic Republic of Congo, or DR Congo, or DRC for short is one of the most important countries in the world for current mineral extraction, producing 84% of the world’s cobalt in 2024, but the key fact is the drop to the country in second place – Russia – at just 4%. As a critical component in lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles (EV’s) and all our electronic devices one can see that the DRC is strategically vital to all of our economies.

In terms of copper production, the DRC performs at a ‘lowly’ second place, providing 17% of the world’s output, but at 3.3 million tons it is a lot more than the 200,000 tons of cobalt. Less well known is the fact that the DRC produces the second largest amount of industrial-grade diamonds per year.

As an active mining region, mineral specimens are still being found and what we present today are new discoveries. Unfortunately, the flow of specimens is not huge considering the amount of mining which is being carried out and what we offer is the very best of what we see available.

We are all familiar with copper producing some very beautiful and colourful blue and green mineral species, but why, you might well ask, does cobalt, a silvery-grey metallic element lead to brightly coloured minerals? Well, when cobalt ions combine with carbonate or arsenate ions the resultant crystallized forms are usually pink to magenta in colour and in the case of cobalt-bearing Calcite (calcium carbonate) only a tiny percentage of cobalt needs to substitute for calcium ions to produce a pink colour.

Today’s update shows the range of spectacular colours better than most regional updates, with vivid pink Cobaltoan (cobalt-bearing) Calcite in many different crystal habits and shades of pink, wonderful intense green Malachite stalactites and botryoids, and spectacular bright turquoise-blue chrysocolla replacing weird and wonderful earlier crystal forms. Even the rare species Kolwezite chips in with some lovely olive-green velvety crystal sprays.

Elsewhere, we are all set for the Bakewell Show (The Rock Exchange) in Derbyshire this coming Saturday and Sunday (October 10-11). I will be there in person with my colleague Roan, with an amazing selection of classic British specimens along with an extensive suite of UK Mining Ventures Fluorite. If you are there, please do come over and say hello.

Next week our update takes us to South America. Have a great weekend, whether you are at a mineral show or not.

Please note: Today's featured specimens are all situated at our UK showroom.