Ethiopia opens 600-tonne precious metals refinery as it targets Africa’s gold-processing business - Business Insider Africa

AI desk brief

Ethiopia has opened a National Precious Metals Refinery in Addis Ababa with more than 600 tonnes of annual processing capacity at full scale, aiming to refine gold into export-ready bullion and manufacture cast and minted gold and silver bars. The project, backed by Ethiopian Investment Holdings and Dubai-based Sam Precious Metals, is pitched as a regional hub that could attract producers from across Africa rather than sending metal offshore for refining.

For the market, the immediate impact is more structural than price-moving: the facility adds potential processing capacity and could redirect some regional refining and certification flows toward Ethiopia if it secures feedstock, accreditation and customers. Actual throughput remains unproven, so the main watchpoints are contract wins, utilization rates and whether the plant becomes a meaningful African bullion conduit.