Yaoundé, Cameroon (PANA) – The Cameroonian government will this month begin an aerial geophysical survey of the country, an official source said on Tuesday in Yaoundé.
According to the Cameroonian minister of Industry, Mines and Technological Development, Emmanuel Bondé, the national campaign was aimed at securing the country’s geophysical map in order to identify areas where there were minerals.
He said the project, which was expected to be completed in June 2015, would cover nearly 160,000 sq km kilometers in six of the 10 regions described to be among the areas where mining resources had not yet been exploited.
The areas are Ndikinimeki, Bafia, Lintë, Nanga Eboko (Central Region), Bertoua Ndeng-Ndeng (East), Ngaoundere Tibati, Bogodo in the region of Adamawa, Polite and Tchamba (North), Douala in the Littoral and Bafoussam in the West.
The World Bank has allocated 2.1 billion CFA francs for the project that is expected to be implemented by the Capacity Building Project in the Mining Sector, whose French acronym is PRECASEM.
The project will use small aircraft with navigation sensors – CESSNA and C2088 – to study the composition of the soil and minerals.
According to the coordinator of PRECASEM, William Mananga, the aircraft would fly at an optimum altitude of between 80 and 120 m and at a distance of 500 m of each other to ensure there was proper data collection.
“Once completed, the campaign will help improve the efficiency and transparency in the management of the mining sector, improve frameworks for sustainable development and in the promotion of competitiveness,” he said.
Only 40 per cent of the 475,000 sq km of Cameroonian land has undergone geophysical survey.
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