Zambia's diverse mineral endowment is entirely a function of the variety
of geological terrains and the multiplicity of thermal and tectonic events
that have overprinted and shaped these terrains.
The resulting geological domain search have
specific metallogenic characteristics in terms of known mineral
occurrences that can be successfully utilized to direct further
exploration. Equally important, the understanding of the processes that
formed these domains has reached a level at which lateral thinking and
conceptual modeling can be used to generate important new exploration
targets.
See Geological Map of Zambia
The complex geology and multiplicity of
techno-thermal events reflects Zambia's somewhat unique position
effectively sandwiched between the Kasai, Zimbabwe - Kaapvall and Tanzania
cratons. Differential movements between these stable blocks, together with
their buttressing effects, have played an important role in the geological
evolution of the country and hence in the genesis of the country's mineral
and energy resources.
The oldest succession of rocks in the
country, the basement supergroup, consists mostly of granitic gneissis and
migmatites which are evident throughout eastern, central and southern
Zambia, in places in-folded with meta-carbonate, meta-quartzite and meta-pelite
units. The super group rocks are mostly younger than 2050 ma but the
Lutembwe River granulite near Chipata has been dated at c.3000 Ma.
Granite, granite gneiss, migmatites and amphoblolites, believed to belong
mostly to the basement supergroup, also outcrop in the structurally
elevated Kafue Anticline and Domes of the Copperbelt and north-western
Zambia.
The overlying meta-sedimentary Muva
Supergroup generally exhibits a tectonized contact with the basement
sequences. In central and eastern Zambia the sequence of meta-pelites and
meta-quartzites is commonly infolded and even imbricated with the basement
rocks, the two sequences being later folded to form the core of the
Irumide Belt extending north-eastwards from Kabwe to Mpika, also forming a
major component of the Zambezi Belt south and east of Lusaka. Within the
Bangweulu Block of northern Zambia the sedimentary sequences is very
different, comprising a lower 5000m thick succession of continental
sediments (rudites, arenites, quartzites and argillites) - the Mporokoso
Group, overlain by quartzites, hematitic sandstones, mudstones and minor
conglomerates of the Kasama Formation which ranges in thickness from from
c.100m over the Bangweulu Block to 3500m southwards into the Irumide Belt.
Geology of Zambia
