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GOLD
April 2015
MODERN MINING
27
The Hummingbird camp at
the Dugbe project in Liberia.
the brink of construction
Hummingbird in a deal worth US$20 mil-
lion,” Betts says. “They’re now the biggest
shareholder in Hummingbird, with a stake of
approximately 25 %. They could have taken
cash but they’ve chosen to retain a significant
interest in the project.”
Hummingbird is planning a smaller devel-
opment than Gold Fields envisaged. “They
were proposing a 3 Mt/a operation but we’ve
scaled it down as we’re targeting the low strip
ratio oxide resources,” Betts explains. “Our
strategy is to get into production fast with a low
cost, low technical risk project which can – if
necessary – be expanded at a later stage. We’ve
optimised all the previous work undertaken on
the project and our Optimisation Study, which
we’ve recently released, indicates very robust
economics for the planned development.”
The optimised project targets 100 000 ounces
of gold production in the first full year after
ramp up and 79 000 ounces a year (on average)
for the balance of the mine life. C1 cash operat-
ing costs are estimated at US$641/oz and all-in
sustaining costs at US$733/oz. Assuming a gold
price of US$1 250/oz, the project will deliver a
post-tax NPV (8 %) of US$72,4 million and an
IRR of 35,1 %. The payback period (after tax) is
put at three years.
Yanfolila has a total gold inventory of
1,8 million ounces, contained in an indicated
resource of 8,2 Mt at a grade of 3,3 g/t and an
inferred resource of 11,9 Mt at 2,5 g/t. The cur-
rent mine plan, however, includes only 6,3 Mt
of ore and is based on progressively mining
five deposits (some of which consist of several
pits): Komana East, Komana West, Guirin West,
Sanioumale East and Sanioumale West.
The plant has been designed to process
1 Mt/a of a 50:50 blend of oxide and fresh ore
giving a likely higher capacity when process-
ing softer oxide ore and offering the potential
to extend the LOM through processing fresh
ore. Hummingbird will contract a mining
service provider to apply industry standard
open-pit mining methods according to its mine
production schedule. A competitive tender is
underway for awarding this contract.
Mining methods will include excavating
the soft oxidised ore near the surface, and
drilling and blasting harder transitional and
some fresh rock – 67 % of ore processed dur-
ing the LOM is oxide ore. Drilling and blasting