Abstract: In order to understand the economic value of rare earth ore resources in a mining area in Madagascar, and provide a basis for the development and utilization and the determination of the beneficiation process, a detailed process mineralogical study of the ore was carried out. The results showed that the main minerals containing rare earth components in the ore is bastnaesite and monazite. These two minerals are in a good state of occurrence, the total rare earth oxide (TREO) grade is up to 12.20%, and mainly light rare earth components are Ce, La and Nd. The dissemination characteristics of bastnaesite is coarse, greater than 0.1 mm accounting for 61.13%, which is conducive to separate and recovery rare earth minerals with gravity separation. Because of the large density difference between bastnaesite and goethite, mica and quartz, which are in close contact with each other, it can be separated by gravity separation process. While the separation between bastnaesite and barite with high content and similar density can be realized by means of electromagnetic characteristics difference.

Key words: bastnaesite ores, process mineralogy, dissemination characteristics, partition ratio