The Ndola Rural Emerald field covers a total area of about 200Km2 to the west of the Kafue River in the Luanshya area. The present knowledge on the geology and mineralisation of the area is a result of both regional geological mapping by the Geological Survey of Zambia and exploration companies since the 1930s. The more recent data on the deposits is scattered in various unpublished consultancy reports, which have generally added to the extent of mineralised areas.

The oldest rocks belonging to the basement complex comprise gneiss and granite gneiss with minor schist, quartzite and amphibolite. The rocks are correlated with the Ca 1.7-2 by old Paleoproterozoic rocks, which form the basement complex throughout the Lufilian belt. The basement complex is unconformably overlain by the Muva Supergroup, a Mesoproterozoic supracrustal sequence of quartzites, schists, and metabasite . Emerald mineralization is confined to the mafic units.

In the Kafubu area, Hickman, (1972) considered the Muva stratigraphy to consist of a basal quartzite-schist unit that is overlain by a coarse-grained re-crystallized sugary to flaggy quartzite. This is followed by Gnt-Ky-Bt (Musc) schist, then talc-magnetite schist and lastly mica biotite-muscovite schist and fine-grained micaceous quartzite. The youngest stratigraphic unit belongs to the Katanga Supergroup; a low-grade metasedimentary sequence consisting of quartzites, argillites, and carbonates.

Emerald mineralization in Zambia  is the result of a metasomatic reaction between metabasite units ( Talc Magnetite Schist) carrying chromium and pegmatite intrusions carrying beryllium. This result  also forms an alteration unit called Biotite Phlogopite Schist, which acts as a host rock for emerald mineralization, as exhibited at EKS plot 257A.