Ivanhoe accelerates work on Makoko copper project in Congo after 30% resource boost

Ivanhoe Mines IVN-T is accelerating work on its giant Makoko copper discovery in Democratic Republic of Congo after increasing the resource by 30 per cent, bolstering plans for what the company says is the world’s largest and highest-grade copper discovery of the past decade.

The update was issued on Tuesday as rising copper prices and a dwindling pipeline of major discoveries sharpen concerns over future supply.

Congo, already the world’s second-largest copper producer, is becoming increasingly central to that outlook.

Ivanhoe, alongside China’s Zijin and the Congolese government, jointly owns the Kamoa-Kakula copper complex, one of Congo’s top producers.

The Canadian miner said the Makoko District in its Western Forelands project now has 42 million metric tons of indicated resources grading 2.66-per-cent copper and 612 million tons of inferred resources grading 1.8-per-cent copper, containing about 12 million tons of copper.

The company said the Western Forelands discoveries rank as the world’s largest and highest-grade copper finds of the past decade.

Ivanhoe plans to begin a scoping study for Makoko in the first quarter of 2027 and is preparing to expand drilling further to support rapid project development.

The company said project development is expected to include a series of shallow open pits alongside underground mining, a combination it believes could lower capital costs and shorten the timeline to first production.

Ivanhoe said development of Makoko could benefit from lessons learned during the rapid build-out of Kamoa-Kakula, which advanced from discovery to first production in less than six years.

The company has already started site preparation activities, including fencing, road construction and environmental baseline work.

Ivanhoe’s founder Robert Friedland said the discovery continued to grow and remained open in multiple directions, with about 60,000 metres of drilling completed in 2026 not yet incorporated into the latest resource estimate.