Société des Mines de Fer de Guinée (SMFG) has, for the first time, held a board of directors meeting in Guinea to discuss the progress of its iron mining project on the Nimba Mountains, in the prefecture of Lola, in southeastern Guinea. It is a project structured in phases, and phase I of the project, which was renamed in November 2024 KON KWENI ("Iron Pebbles", in the Kono language), consists of "a fairly simple development phase, a production phase", according to the Chairman of the Board of Directors of SMFG, Robert ADAM, speaking to our colleagues at Radiotélévision Guinée (RTG), Guinea’s public television channel.

This meeting of the board of directors allowed strategic decisions to be made according to the director general of SMFG, who says that "It was a board that allowed us to make strategic decisions on how to orient the project, what are the measures that we need to put in place so that the next phases go as smoothly as possible...".

The SMFG project is in the process of finalising the Environmental and Social Impact Assessments (ESIA), through the South African firm Zutari. The results of these studies are expected in the second half of 2025. And the construction phase could take place just after these results.

The Société des Mines de Fer de Guinée (SMFG) operates as a joint venture, with 85% ownership held by Ivanhoe Atlantic Inc. (previously known as High Power Exploration, HPX, founded by billionaire Robert Friedland), 10% by the Guinean State, and the remaining 5% by MIFERGUI.