LONDON, March 19 (Reuters) - Alphamin Resources' ( AFMJF )

decision to suspend operations at the Bisie tin mine in the

Democratic Republic of Congo underscores the fragility of tin's

global supply chain.

Just as one of the world's largest tin mines in Myanmar

shows signs of returning after a prolonged absence, another key

mine closes as the M23 rebel group advances deeper into the

Congo's minerals-rich Kivu provinces.

Tin's supply volatility is once again generating price

volatility. London Metal Exchange three-month tin surged

11.5% to a near three-year high of $37,100 per metric ton on the

news.

But the spreading conflict in Congo poses a more insidious

problem for the global tin market. It's not just units that are

being lost to the market, it's also transparency around the

region's artisanal production.

SUPPLY-CHAIN IMPACT

The Bisie mine produced 17,300 tons of contained tin last

year, representing around 6% of global mine supply.

Alphamin Resources ( AFMJF ) has been ramping up operations at what

was originally an artisanal mine, targeting production of 20,000

tons this year prior to the suspension of activities.

The mine has become a key supplier of raw material to

China's smelters, helping compensate for the loss of supply from

the Man Maw mine in Myanmar since its suspension in August 2023.

The Wa State authorities controlling Man Maw have just

opened the process for issuing new mining permits, flagging its

pending restart.

But it will take several months for operations to resume

after such a long closure and the simultaneous loss of Bisie

compounds China's short-term raw materials challenge.

China's refined tin production has been remarkably resilient

despite the loss of feed from Man Maw. National output rose by

4.6% year-on-year in 2024, according to the International Tin

Association.

The growth was down to unprecedented use of scrap, feeding a

14.9% year-on-year jump in secondary production, and to the

drawdown of concentrates stocks, the ITA said.

Inventories are much reduced, and smelters are feeling the

pinch in the form of what local data provider Shanghai Metal

Market describes as historically low conversion margins.

The tin price reaction to the Bisie suspension suggests the

market expects a knock-on impact in the world's largest producer

of refined tin.

LOSS OF TRANSPARENCY

Alphamin's decision to evacuate all non-essential staff from

the Bisie site is a sign of how far the M23 rebel group has

moved beyond the captured city of Goma on the Congo's eastern

border.

As of March 12 the insurgents were within 125 kilometers of

the mine's location in Walikale District in North Kivu.

They are moving through a mineral-rich region, in which

Bisie is the only official-sector tin producer. The rest of the

Congo's production comes from artisanal cooperatives.

Alphamin exported 27,000 tons of tin concentrate in 2024 and

the unofficial sector 16,000 tons, of which 3,300 tons came from

North and South Kivu, according to the Congo ministry of mines.

The Kivu region has long been a testing ground for

incorporating responsible artisanal production into the global

supply chain not just for tin but also for tantalum, tungsten

and coltan.

Compliance with OECD rules on conflict minerals is led by an

organisation called ITSCi, which grew out of the ITA and is now

jointly backed by the Tantalum-Niobium International Study

Centre.

As of a February 28 update, ITSCi had suspended activities

such as inspecting sites and tagging production in "some but not

all areas of North and South Kivu provinces".

This makes it difficult to know what is happening in the

unofficial sector, assuming work is continuing at all. It also

raises the possibility of tin from a widening conflict zone

being illegally exported and entering the official supply chain.

REPUTATIONAL RISK

Such an outcome would undermine years of work in persuading

end-users such as Apple Inc ( AAPL ) that minerals from the

Congo can be responsibly produced even in the artisanal sector.

The ITSCi programme is not without its critics, and is

currently at the center of a lawsuit brought by the Congolese

government against Apple ( AAPL ) subsidiaries in France and Belgium.

But with no checks at all on how much tin is being produced

in the Kivu region's unofficial sector or on where it is going,

the metal of the future is in danger of regaining its

problematic conflict mineral tag of the past.

Evidently, the further the M23 rebels move into the Kivu

region, the risks for both market and market reputation rise.

The group's last-minute withdrawal from talks with the

government suggests they are in no mood to stop just yet.

The opinions expressed here are those of the author, a

columnist for Reuters.

(Editing by Jan Harvey)