Logistics Services for Gold Mine Construction in Burkina Faso

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Burkina Faso’s 10th mine officially began its construction phase in July 2016. Operated by Houndé Gold Operations, a subsidiary of the Canadian Endeavour Mining group, the Houndé site is one of the largest mining projects in West Africa.

With a proven track record in supporting the mining sector in Africa, Bolloré Transport & Logistics was appointed to coordinate and manage the international transport, customs transit formalities and delivery of all of the mines construction equipment, through its subsidiaries Antrak Logistics Australia, Bolloré Transport & Logistics Ivory Coast and Bolloré Transport & Logistics Burkina Faso.

Houndé Gold Operations boasts an integrated door-to-door logistics solution made possible by the strong global presence of Bolloré Transport & Logistics and its extensive integrated logistics network.

It was decided that the Group’s local branch in Bobo-Dioulasso, which was less than 100 km from the mine site, be established as the Project office. Ideally located within close proximity to Bobo- Inter, Customs and Cotecna’s offices the decision to boast resources in Bobo Dioulasso proved to be a key factor for the groups’ appointment for the construction contract.

The project team consists of six dedicated personnel, who are responsible for the clearance and delivery of goods to site.  Bobo Dioulasso also allowed the project team to visit site for regular meetings with the client team and significantly reduced transport costs in the process, ensuring that operational deadlines and stringent KPIs were achieved.

Bearing in mind that the ‘On-time / On-budget’ principle is of paramount importance in the industry and it is therefore a major milestone that the project to date is ahead of schedule. To date, Antrak Logistics has consigned 147 tons of airfreight, 1,375 TEUs and 9,750 Freight tons of project cargo for the Houndé Gold project, and all without any work accidents being reported.

Having established a close working relationship with both the EPCM contractors Lycopodium Minerals, and the project owners, Endeavour Mining on previous construction contracts, Bolloré Logistics and its subsidiaries were able to understand critical paths, extremely tight construction schedules and pre-empt seasonal influences affecting the availability of trucks during the country export season.
In this case, Bolloré Transport & Logistics Ivory Coast was able to launch dedicated block trains through Sitarail, one of the Group’s railway concessions, to transport containers via rail from Abidjan port to Bobo-Dioulasso Inter. So far, Sitarail has dispatched nine dedicated block-trains each consisting of up to 50 TEUs per train.

Communication and pro-activity have been one of the key strategies which will ensure that the Houndé Gold Operation will meet the principals’ delivery schedule. Antrak Logistics & Bolloré Logistics are pleased to have been a contributor to this project.