Trafigura consortium secures US$753m to revive strategic African rail corridor

Photo source: Trafigura

The refurbishment of a railway connecting the copper and cobalt heartlands of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Zambia to the Atlantic has secured a major financing boost, marking a significant step in Washington’s efforts to counter Chinese dominance over the region’s critical minerals. The Lobito Atlantic Railway (LAR) consortium, which includes Singapore-headquartered commodities trader Trafigura, has finalised a US$753m financing package. The deal comprises US$553m from the US International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) and US$200m from the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA).

The funds will finance upgrades to track infrastructure, workshops, signalling systems, and rolling stock along the 1,300km line stretching from the Angolan port of Lobito to Luau on the DRC border. The route then extends a further 400km into the DRC to Kolwezi, plugging into the national network, with plans to connect directly to Zambia.

The railway is the shortest direct import-export route between the Copperbelt mining region and international markets via the Atlantic Ocean. Traditionally, copper and cobalt were transported via longer routes through Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, Beira in Mozambique, or Durban in South Africa, journeys that can take weeks. The distance from Kolwezi to Lobito is roughly half that to Durban. The LAR consortium, comprising Trafigura, Portuguese construction group Mota-Engil, and Belgian rail operator Vecturis, was awarded a 30-year concession in 2022 to operate and maintain both the railway and the mineral terminal at the Port of Lobito. In December, the agency also signed a letter of interest regarding an equity investment in a joint venture between the DRC state-run miner Gécamines and Mercuria Energy Trading. The partnership is expected to enhance the commercialisation of copper, cobalt, and other critical minerals, helping to secure US supply chains.

The US financing intensifies a geopolitical contest that is already well underway. In November, just prior to the DFC announcement, China signed a US$1.4bn agreement with Zambia and Tanzania to revitalise and upgrade the Tazara railway with links the Zambian copper mines to the Tanzanian port of Dar es Salaam. Originally financed and built by China in the 1970s to break the chokehold of apartheid South Africa over Zambian copper exports the railway line has significantly deteriorated and is currently operating at a fraction of its original 5m tonne annual capacity.

While the Lobito corridor underscores US determination to challenge Chinese hold on the extraction of the region’s natural resources it does nothing to address the wide gap between the processing capacity of critical minerals over which China has an overwhelming global dominance. That means even if the Western-backed Lobito railway succeeds in extracting a larger share of the minerals from the DRC-to-Zambia copper belt most of it will end up getting processed in China anyway. It is difficult to see, therefore, how this will break Chinese hold over African critical minerals. Neither does this investment make any meaningful contribution to value addition for the domestic mining industry either. The Lobito corridor looks more or less like a colonial era mine-to-port extractive investment aimed purely at exploiting African natural resources with little or no beneficiation for Africans themselves. To that extent it is no different to the Chinese backed railway that the US aims to counter. Such investments, say critics, only enrich corrupt authoritarian leaders, their cronies and shareholders of mining firms while impoverishing and exploiting the communities that live in the areas where mining occurs.

References

'Angola, Zambia push Lobito Corridor rail project as financing talks advance', Reuters, 24 June 2025

'China signs agreement to revamp Tazara railway in Zambia', Reuters, 20 November 2025

'Beijing backs rail project to rival EU/US Lobito Corridor', Africa Confidential, 24 November 2025

'DFC strengthens strategic partnerships with the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda', U.S. International Development Finance Corporation, 05 December 2025

'DFC CEO Ben Black signs loan agreement for Lobito Atlantic Railway, securing critical minerals for mutual U.S.–Africa benefit', U.S. International Development Finance Corporation, 17 December 2025

'Lobito Atlantic Railway secures USD753 million to accelerate development in Angola', Trafigura, 17 December 2025

'Africa Finance Corporation acts as co-financial adviser for Angola’s Lobito Atlantic Railway concession', Africa Finance Corporation, 02 January 2026