Modern Mining June 2016

WEST AFRICA

Yaramoko – just 13 months from breaking ground to pouring gold

Canada’s Roxgold Inc, listed on the TSX-V, has poured the first gold at its Yaramoko gold project in Burkina Faso – 13 months after breaking ground at the site. The initial gold pour totalled 1 020 ounces. Located 200 km south-west of Ougadougou, Burkina Faso’s capital, within the Houndé greenstone belt, Yaramoko is a low-cost, high-grade underground mine representing an investment of US$110,8 million. The mine is designed to produce 99 500 ounces a year over an initial mine life of 7,4 years at a LOM all-in sustaining cost of US$590 per ounce.

operation, four sublevels are fully developed to the eastern end of the resource and ore de- velopment is continuing to the western end of the first mining block on three levels. Ore development is expected to increase further when development commences in Block 2 on the western side of the deposit. Stoping opera- tions in Block 1 will commence in July, further increasing the mine’s productivity. As of mid-May, there were approximately 30 000 tonnes of mill feed grade ore on the run of mine (ROM) pad. This represents approxi- mately six weeks of plant throughput at the nameplate level of 750 tonnes per day (t/d) and, together with development ore, should ensure that the processing plant is adequately supplied through the ramp up phase. The processing plant was built on an EPC basis by a South African joint venture of DRA and Group Five and has been designed to be easily expandable. According to Roxgold,

T he ‘Plant Practical Completion and Processing Performance Tests’ confirming nameplate throughput and recovery assumptions were completed over a month ahead of schedule and mine development remains ahead of plan year to date. In the underground

The Yaramoko processing plant which has a capacity of 270 000 t/a (photo: Roxgold).

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28  MODERN MINING  June 2016