Mineral Titles & Compliance

Titles held in our own name

Every site Ayotaye operates is worked under a mineral title held by Ayotaye Minerals Limited itself, granted by the Mining Cadastre Office under the Nigerian Minerals and Mining Act. We do not operate on another party's licence, and we do not buy production from workings whose title we cannot verify.

Our current portfolio comprises:

• Exploration Licences covering our early-stage ground in Oyo State.
• Small Scale Mining Leases and Mining Leases covering the producing operations in Plateau and Nasarawa States.
• A Mining Lease covering the lead–zinc concession under development in Kogi State.

Title numbers, coordinates and expiry dates are provided to counterparties and prospective partners on request, under a confidentiality agreement where appropriate.

Assay and certification

No consignment leaves a site on an assurance. Every lot is sampled and assayed by an independent laboratory before shipment, and the certificate travels with the consignment. Buyers are free to nominate their own laboratory, and we raise no objection to a second assay at the buyer's cost.

Our sampling, documentation and record-keeping follow an ISO-aligned framework. We do not currently hold certification to an ISO standard, and we say so rather than implying otherwise.

Chain of custody

For every consignment we record the licence it was produced under, the site, the date of production, the processing route, the recorded weight at each transfer and the haulier who moved it. That record is available to the buyer as a matter of course, not on request.

For tantalum, tin and tungsten, the minerals subject to the strictest international sourcing rules, chain-of-custody documentation from pit to port accompanies every shipment, and we support buyer due diligence consistent with the OECD Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible Supply Chains of Minerals from Conflict-Affected and High-Risk Areas.

Export documentation

Mineral export from Nigeria requires more than a bill of lading, and we handle the whole set in-house rather than through an agent: mineral export permits, certificates of origin, assay certificates, customs entries and the associated Central Bank documentation. Keeping this function inside the company is what allows us to commit to delivery dates.

Responsible sourcing

We will not buy, process or ship material where:

• the title under which it was produced cannot be established;
• there is credible indication of child labour or forced labour in its production;
• proceeds would support armed groups, or where production is linked to serious human rights abuses;
• it originates from a protected area or from ground we know to be under dispute.

Where a supplier cannot satisfy us on these points, we decline the material. We would rather lose a parcel than have to explain one.

Health, safety and environment

Sites operate under documented HSE procedures covering induction, personal protective equipment, equipment inspection and incident reporting. Blood-lead monitoring is in place on sulphide operations. Water management is designed into every wash plant, and rehabilitation is planned into pit design from the first bench rather than retrofitted at closure.

Host communities

Land access and community development agreements are concluded before mobilisation. Each site has a named community relations officer employed by Ayotaye, not by a contractor, who host communities can raise a concern with directly.

Raising a concern

If you have a concern about the conduct of any Ayotaye operation, any person acting for us, or the provenance of material we have supplied, write to info@ayotayeminerals.com marked for the attention of the Compliance function. Concerns can be raised anonymously, and we will not retaliate against anyone who raises one in good faith.