The Cajati carbonatite-hosted apatite mine in southern Brazil recovers apatite from the world-famous Jacupiranga carbonatite. Calcite is recovered as a by-product from the tailings resulting from beneficiation of apatite, and is used in the cement industry. Mining at Cajati began in 1943 with the extraction of supergene ores with about 20% P2O5. 30 years later mining progressed into bedrock ores with 5% P2O5.

Carbonatite is younger than the abundant jacupirangite (nepheline-magnetite-titanaugite) in the open pit mine and where the two rocks are in contact the edges of jacupirangite breccia blocks are metasomatised to distinctly banded sodic fenites. Disseminated pyrrhotite and magnetite are common in the carbonatite.

The phosphate ore is extracted through surface mining by drilling and blasting, loaded into trucks and transported to the beneficiation plant on-site at Cajati.

The Brazilian phosphate industry has made great efforts to develop technology for the production of phosphates from slimes. The first industrial application was in the Araxá concentrator in the beginning of the 1980s, in a circuit consisting of desliming in 40 mm hydrocyclones and apatite flotation in column machines. This technology has been upgraded since 1984 by means of significant improvements in the desliming operation, concerning equipment and process control, utilization of a more adequate reagent system, and the use of flotation machines that provide improved performance and metallurgical yield. The concept of this process was still expanded to other Brazilian plants located in Catalão (Goiás state), Tapira (Minas Gerais state), and Cajati (São Paulo state) in the 1990s. It is estimated that the apatite concentrate from slimes represents 11% to 13% of the overall production. The apatite concentrate grade achieved from slimes are P2O5 at 33.0–35%; Fe2O3 at 3.0–6.5%; Al2O3 at 0. ........