(Bloomberg) -- Ivanhoe Mines Ltd. will ship copper from its giant project in the Democratic Republic of Congo by rail to a port in Angola under a trial agreement to gauge whether the route can cut transport costs.

The Vancouver-based miner will move 10,000 tons of copper from its Kamoa-Kakula joint venture in southeastern Congo via the so-called Lobito Corridor to the Atlantic Ocean in the final quarter of this year, the company said in a statement Wednesday. The trial shipment will travel along a railway operated on the Angola side of the border by a consortium including commodity trader Trafigura Group, it said.

Ivanhoe – founded by billionaire mining investor Robert Friedland – began exporting copper at Kamoa-Kakula in mid-2021 and produced more than 330,000 tons of the metal from the mine last year. The company’s partners in the project include China’s Zijin Mining Group Co. and Congo’s government.

The firm currently ships all its copper from the mine by truck to ports in South Africa, Tanzania and Namibia. Using the railway to the port of Lobito in Angola, which is closer to Kamoa-Kakula, “could significantly improve the logistics costs and carbon footprint of exporting metals,” the statement said.

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