Azerbaijan, Baku, April 4 / Trend, A.Akhundov /
Anglo-Asian Mining plc company, a gold producer in Azerbaijan, plans to begin a new program on drilling at the Gedabek Mineral Deposit, the company's report says on Wednesday.
"Indications from the 3,420 metres of drilling completed since Phase 1 and Phase 2 drilling included in the JORC-compliant mineral resource estimate highlight the significant potential to further upgrade and increase the size of this deposit," Anglo Asian CEO Reza Vaziri said.
Drilling continues south and southeast of the Gedabek Mineral Deposit.
The technical and economic feasibility of future mineral processing alternatives are being assessed to increase the gold, copper and silver recovery.
According to the company's new estimates, measured and indicated resources amount to 1,054,382 ounces (29.89 tons), copper - 81,765 tones, and silver - 8,608,551 (244,05 tons). It is necessary to process 37.11 million tons of ore.
Given the estimated, nominal and possible reserves at the deposit 1,276,422 ounces of gold (over 36 tons) can be mined after processing of 48.14 million tons of ore, which exceeds previous estimates by 61 percent, 94,890 tons of copper (a 93-percent increase), 10,305,653 ounces of silver (over 292 tons) with forecast growth at 36 percent.
Vaziri said reaching over 1 million ounces of gold in the measured and indicated resource category is a significant milestone for the company.
"It underpins the production potential and the inherent value of Gedabek that we first saw when we commenced mining in 2009," he said.
He said in tandem with this, the company is also actively establishing the second mining project in Azerbaijan, Gosha, located 50km away from Gedabek.
Gold production for the year totaled 57,068 oz of gold (1.62 tons), 611 tons of copper and 46,940 oz of silver (1.33 tons).
Anglo Asian Mining Plc owns the rights to develop six fields in southwest Azerbaijan at Gedabey, Ordubad, Gosha Bulag, Gizil Bulag, Vejnali and Soyutlu. The concession is based on PSA agreements signed with the Azerbaijani government in August 1997. It is expected to produce about 400 tons of gold, 2,500 tons of silver and 1.5 million tons of copper on the fields under the contract.
The first gold and silver were extracted from the Gadabay mine on May 2009.