Nigeria is positioning itself as Africa's leading hub for refining critical minerals. A $400 million rare earth processing plant under construction in Uke, Nasarawa State, is central to this strategy.
Hasetins Commodities Limited, a Nigerian firm, is developing the facility. It will add 12,000 tonnes annually to the market once operational.
When fully commissioned, the plant will boost the company's total output to 18,000 tonnes per year. This volume would place Nigeria ahead of other African nations in the global green energy supply chain.
Federal regulators conducted a joint inspection of the site last week. Ganiyu Imam, Director of the Mining Inspectorate, led the team from the Ministry of Solid Minerals Development.
Oladehinde Oladusi, a Deputy Director in the Mines Environmental Compliance department, accompanied Imam. They assessed the project's compliance with regulations and infrastructure progress.
Imam told reporters the investment reflects government policy to discourage raw ore exports. Nigeria wants to process minerals domestically and retain their economic value instead.
According to him, the facility meets operational standards set by regulators. This represents a shift from Nigeria's historical pattern of extracting raw minerals and exporting them.
Traditionally, mining operators extracted resources without establishing local processing capacity. The Nasarawa project breaks that cycle, officials said.
Developers have completed a comprehensive Environmental and Social Impact Assessment. Regulators instructed project operators to maintain these safeguards as construction proceeds.
International energy markets now demand strict Environmental, Social, and Governance compliance. Hasetins has built its processing architecture around sustainable practices to meet these requirements.
It's a closed-loop system designed to minimize air emissions and manage industrial waste. The model also protects local aquifers from potential contamination.
Prince Jidayi heads Hasetins as Managing Director and CEO. He stressed that domestic refining keeps wealth within Nigeria during the energy transition.
For decades, margins in the sector have been squeezed by raw extraction and immediate export, Jidayi noted. His facility will process rare earth elements alongside critical metals like Tantalum, Tungsten, and Tin.
The company plans to source feedstock from multiple locations across the country. Satellite separation centers will support the central hub in Uke to reach full capacity.
This distributed network aims to bring artisanal and small-scale miners into the formal economy. These operators have traditionally worked outside official regulatory frameworks for years.
