Titanium Resources Group, a miner of rutile and ilmenite in Sierra Leone, held talks with the government of Cameroon over developing bauxite deposits in the West African country.

"Our company intends to invest and develop Cameroon`s mineral resources," Len Comerford, chief executive officer of the Tortola, British Virgin Islands-based company, told reporters on January 10 in the capital, Yaounde.

We will "carry out feasibility studies within the next 12 months," he added. Comerford on January 10 met with Prime Minister Ephraim Inoni to find ways of spurring the exploitation of bauxite, the main raw material in aluminum production.

Major aluminium producer Rio Tinto said on November 30 that it may build a 400,000t/y smelter in Cameroon.

Demand for bauxite, which is refined to alumina and then smelted to produce aluminum, is forecast to increase about 33% to 88 Mt/y by 2011 from current levels, Tim Dudley, a mining analyst in London at Arbuthnot Securities Ltd, said last month.

Comerford said mining operations would benefit local communities through funding for schools, clinics and roads. Titanium Resources also produces bauxite in Sierra Leone.

Last May, Cameroon estimated that the Minim-Martap and Ngaoundal deposits in the Adamawa highlands, 600 km (370 miles) east of Yaounde, may contain more than 1,000 Mt of bauxite with a similar quantity elsewhere in the country.

In April, Dubai Aluminium Co signed an agreement with the government to explore for and mine bauxite.

Rio Tinto and Cameroon`s government both own 46.7% of the existing 90,000 t/y Alucam aluminum smelter in Edea.