The Ministry of Mines and Petroleum has signed a $6.2 million contract with a Turkish company for the extraction of marble from the Dara-e-Noor mine in Shah WaliKot district, Kandahar.
At the signing event, acting Minister of ines and Petroleum Hedayatullah Badri said that the contract would create jobs for hundreds of people, and the company has also committed to providing social services to the local population.
The three-square-kilometer mine has been leased to the company for 30 years.
Badri said: “The company will invest $6.2 million in extraction, exploration, and processing. It has pledged to operate the mine according to international standards.”
He also noted that since the Islamic Emirate regained power, the Ministry of Mines and Petroleum has signed several marble extraction contracts, and this agreement with the Turkish company is part of those efforts.
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Meanwhile, the company’s deputy representative, speaking at the event, said they will utilize nearly 40 years of experience to process and introduce Afghan marble to global markets.
Musa Emioglu, deputy representative of the company, said: “Our short-term commitment is to extract and process Afghanistan’s marble and introduce it worldwide while building a dedicated customer base for this product.”
Economic analyst Abdul Ghafar Nazami emphasized the importance of ensuring that foreign investors have expertise in relevant fields before contracts are awarded.
“Foreign investors should be carefully assessed to determine their expertise so that contracts are given in the right sectors. In general, specialization must be considered,” Nazami said.
Currently, Turkmenistan is one of Afghanistan’s largest buyers of marble.
According to the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, 108 marble processing factories are currently operational across the country.
This news is sourced from [Tolo News] and is for informational purposes only.
