www.cgamining.com
CGA Mining (ASX:CGX, TSX:CGA) and its subsidiaries, is a producing gold mining company, with its principal asset being the +200,000 ounce per annum Masbate Gold Mine in the Philippines. The Masbate Gold Project has total resources of approximately 7.7m ounces and and reserves of 3m ounces.
The Masbate Gold Project is the largest operating gold project in the Philippines. Construction on the process plant was successfully completed in February 2009, less than 2 years after acquisition of the project, with the construction and installation of the power plant completed in April 2009. First gold was poured on 12 May 2009, with over 1 tonne of gold poured by September 09 and total production in excess of 150,000 ounces in the first year of operation. The project is forecast to produce over 200,000 ounces per annum and an expansion to 6.5mtpa is planned in 2010/2011 to further increase the production profile of the project.
The Company is focussed on enhancing the value of the Masbate Gold Project by both production growth and an aggressive exploration program on the highly prospective tenements and identifying new growth opportunities, through judicious and profitable acquisition programmes.
CGA Mining nears 6.5 million tonnes per annum throughput at Masbate Gold Mine
Dual listed Philippines focused gold producer CGA Mining (TSX:CGA, ASX:CGX) slipped 2% in trading today despite reporting that its plant availability at the Masbate gold mine was 2.7% ahead of management`s forecast of 92%. The emerging gold producer reported the milestone in a brief update to shareholder this morning to coincide with its maiden year of operations at Masbate.
The processing plant at Masbate was initially designed to operate at a rate of 4 million tonnes per annum (Mtpa), but the Sydney and Toronto listed company reported today that a US$15 million investment program was `well advanced` which would increase throughput to 6.5 Mpta. In August the company achieved throughput of 0.538 million tonnes.
For the twelve month period ended June 30, 2010, CGA Mining milled 4.5 Mtpa at an average grade of 1.26 grams per tonne gold with plant availability of 88.9% and recoveries of 83.2%. This produced 150,143 ounces of gold at a an average cash cost of US$548 per ounce.
The Masbate Gold Project is the largest gold project in the Philippines and first gold poured in May 2009. It has a total indicated resource base of 4.55 million ounces, total inferred resource base of 3.22 million ounces with a probable reserve of 3.03 million ounces of gold.
The mine will produce at a annualized rate of 200,000 ounces of gold once at a steady state of operations.
Shares in the company are currently sitting just below their 52 week high of CAD$2.60 per share.
CGA also recently spun out its African assets into Ratel Gold (TSX:RTL), which listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange. Ratel Gold is earning a 51% interest in the Segilola Gold Project in Nigeria and holds a 51% interest in the Mkushi Copper Project in Zambia. CGA has retained a 20% equity stake in the Africa focused company.
