Bogota, May 9, 2026, 08:07 COT
- Colombia wants Glencore to start talks with La Guajira officials and communities before Cerrejón’s concession ends in 2034.
- Cerrejón produced 16.8 million tonnes of coal in 2025, down 12% from 2024, after output cuts announced last year.
- Glencore’s latest government-payment disclosure landed the same week, keeping scrutiny on tax, royalties and transition planning.
Colombia’s government has raised pressure on Glencore plc to begin formal talks over the future closure of Cerrejón, asking the miner to meet authorities and community representatives in La Guajira, where the open-pit coal operation sits at the centre of a wider fight over jobs, revenues and the energy transition. The Ministry of Mines and Energy made the call on May 8; Reuters reported Glencore and Cerrejón did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The issue matters now because a 2034 deadline is being pulled into today’s politics. A concession — the legal right to run a mine for a set period — still gives Glencore years at Cerrejón, but the ministry said talks should cover employment, worker retraining, energy investment and new clean-energy ventures before the final years arrive.
The timing is not clean for Glencore. Cerrejón produced 16.8 million tonnes in 2025, 2.3 million tonnes lower than 2024, while Glencore’s total energy-coal output fell 2% to 98.0 million tonnes; the company has set 2026 energy-coal guidance at 95 million to 100 million tonnes.
“We don’t have to wait for the remaining years,” Mines and Energy Minister Edwin Palma said in a statement cited by Reuters. The ministry said the talks should be handled through a tripartite transition committee involving companies, Indigenous communities, local authorities and the national government. Reuters
Glencore took full ownership of Cerrejón after BHP and Anglo American offered to sell their 33.3% stakes in 2021. At the time, Glencore said the mine’s concessions were due to expire by 2034 and that owning the asset fitted its plan for a managed decline of coal.
That leaves Glencore with the exposure that two large mining peers stepped away from. It also gives Colombia one clear company to press as President Gustavo Petro’s government tries to push the country away from new coal and hydrocarbon exploration and toward renewable energy.
Glencore’s wider production plan has not shifted. Chief Executive Gary Nagle said on April 30 that first-quarter production was “largely in line” with expectations and that full-year 2026 production guidance “remains unchanged,” even as Cerrejón cuts weighed on the coal mix. Glencore
The request also came as Glencore published its 2025 Payments to Governments Report, which it said was required under UK disclosure and transparency rules and would be submitted to the Financial Conduct Authority’s National Storage Mechanism. Such reports set out payments such as taxes, royalties and levies, a sensitive area for extractive companies operating in poorer regions.
But the government’s call does not itself close Cerrejón or rewrite the concession. Any plan will have to settle who pays for replacement jobs and energy projects, how local communities are represented, and whether coal prices still support output through the contract period. Delay could raise political and social risk; it may not change production in the near term.
For investors, the Colombia dispute adds another asset-level test to a company already balancing coal cash flow with copper, cobalt, zinc and other transition-linked commodities. Glencore describes itself as a producer and marketer of more than 60 commodities, with more than 140,000 employees and contractors across more than 30 countries.
London trading was on its weekend break. Glencore’s website showed its London-listed shares at 563.50 pence at 16:58 GMT on Friday, down 0.90 pence, while the London Stock Exchange’s regular trading schedule runs Monday to Friday from 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. London time.
