Entreprise Générale du Cobalt (EGC), the Democratic Republic of Congo state-owned entity that holds the exclusive mandate to purchase artisanal cobalt and copper, and commodities trader Trafigura have completed their first shipments of the two metals to international markets via the Lobito Atlantic Railway (LAR), with initial cargoes routed to U.S. customers.
The transaction was executed under an offtake and marketing agreement first concluded between the two parties in 2020.
The 1,300-kilometre railway, with a 450-kilometre extension to Kolwezi in the heart of the Congolese Copperbelt, links the deep-water port of Lobito on Angola's Atlantic coast to mining areas in the DRC. Operators have indicated inland transit times of approximately seven days, positioning the corridor as the shortest route from Kolwezi to an African seaport. LAR is jointly owned by Trafigura, Mota-Engil and Vecturis under a 30-year concession.
The shipment follows EGC's declaration in November of its first 1,000 tonnes of traceable artisanal cobalt — under one percent of annual Congolese cobalt output, but the first material volume produced under an OECD-aligned due-diligence framework. Mercuria Energy Trading announced a parallel first transaction with EGC the same day, with copper cathode designated for delivery to U.S., United Arab Emirates or Saudi customers. Volumes for both transactions were not disclosed.
The operation occurs against a backdrop of significant policy intervention in Kinshasa. A June 2025 ban on cobalt concentrate exports was succeeded in October by an export-quota regime, while an audit-driven suspension of artisanal copper-cobalt processing concluded between December 2025 and January 2026. The audit period was accompanied by civil unrest in Kolwezi.
Infrastructure financing for the corridor has been provided by the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation and the Development Bank of Southern Africa, which together extended $753 million in debt to LAR. The Lobito Corridor falls within the G7's Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment (PGI), under which a U.S. and EU-led consortium has committed in excess of $320 million in grant, equity and debt capital toward the rail expansion.
The shipments establish an operational Atlantic-facing export channel for Congolese critical minerals at a time when Western buyers are seeking diversification from supply chains concentrated in Chinese refining and offtake.
