An agreement for laying a 1,350-kilometre railway track is scheduled for October 2 as the major development occurred in $10bn Reko Diq copper and gold mine project.

Senior officials from the Ministry of Railways will travel to the United Kingdom in connection with the railway agreement, sources said. The Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) has approved bridge financing of $390 million, officials confirmed.

An agreement for this bridge financing will be signed with the Reko Diq Mining Company, sources added. The company will provide $390 million in financing for the railway track from Balochistan to Karachi.

Investors will be granted access to the railway network for train operations. A long railway track will be laid to export minerals from Balochistan.

Through legislation, the Railway Board — rather than the federal government — will oversee the project.

All fees, charges and revenue sharing will be determined with the Railway Board’s approval.

The cost of Phase I of the Reko Diq project is projected at $7.72 billion, while Phase II is expected to cost $3.3 billion.

The cost of Phase I has increased from an earlier estimate of $6.8 billion.

The initial estimate for Phase I of the copper project was $4.3 billion.

A loan of $3.5 billion will be secured for the project, according to officials from the Ministry of Finance. Discussions with international institutions, including the Asian Development Bank (ADB), are under way for project financing.

The project has aimed to begin production by 2028, officials from the Ministry of Finance said.

In the first phase, the annual extraction target is 200,000 tonnes of copper, officials added. Phase I is expected to be completed by 2029, with Phase II commencing in 2034.