Liberty Metals & Mining Holdings, LLC, a subsidiary of Boston-based Liberty Mutual Insurance (LMM), has acquired 25 percent of the shares in “Yara Dallol” for USD 51.25 million.

Yara’s share of the proceeds is USD 35.4 million.

Yara Dallol is a project looking at extracting potash in the Danakil depression in North-Eastern Ethiopia.

The site’s annual production capacity is confirmed to be 600,000 metric tons Sulphate of potash over a 23-year period, according to the feasibility study conducted on the reserve and the technical viability of Dallol project.

Yara states, after this transaction Yara will hold 51.8 percent of the shares, LMM 25 percent and XLR Capital Limited 23.3 percent in Yara Dallol.

Svein Tore Holsether, President and CEO of Yara, said: “The Dallol project will support Yara’s strategy for further development of premium fertilizer for high value crops, and this transaction underlines the attractiveness of the project.”

Yara Dallol plans to launch mining activities by the end of 2018.

Yara was established in 1905 to solve emerging famine in Europe. It has now over 12,000 employees in more than 150 nations.

Source: The Daily Monitor