The Tenke project, in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), is one of the largest copper-cobalt deposits. The American company Freeport McMoRan (formerly Phelps Dodge) and Canada’s Tenke Mining together hold a majority stake in the project. On July 17, 2007, the EIB approved a EUR 100 million loan for the project.

The legal basis of the Tenke project is a contract between the government and the mining consortium. It is one of 60 contracts signed during the war in DRC and under the transitional government which are currently under examination by an inter-ministerial commission in Kinshasa. The contracts are suspected of irregularities, including a lack of transparency, undeclared conflicts of interest, questionable payments, and the inclusion of terms that are highly disadvantageous to the DRC government.

The EIB made disbursement of its loan conditional to final approval of financing by other lenders, as well as the DRC government’s non-objection to the loan. However, the decision to back one of the largest deals under examination, the Tenke Fungurume mine, prejudges the outcome of the review and raises doubts about its objectivity.

At the same time, the financing of a large-scale mining project does not correspond to any of the priorities defined by the EU for cooperation with DRC.

 

It does not contribute to the achievement of the Cotonou Agreement's objectives (poverty alleviation and promotion of sustainable development) either, since the extraction of minerals is by definition not sustainable.

 

It can only contribute to poverty alleviation under certain conditions of governance, environmental protection or respect for human rights, none of which are in place yet in DRC. It is ultimately concerning that the EIB agreed to finance a large scale open pit mine such as Tenke, one that entails significant environmental and social impacts, even though the bank still lacks adequate norms and procedure to assess and mitigate such impacts.