re: Ann: OZ Minerals December 2011 Quarterly ... HT,It was not a...

re: Ann: OZ Minerals December 2011 Quarterly ... HT,

It was not a concern as such, just an observation.

As FGB put it - "it is a rise in basic mining costs"...

This statement and trend holds true as I look across a number of mining operations.

The reason I am interested is because last year we saw a strong fall in commodity prices, followed by rising costs during Q4. Now we are seeing a reversal with prices recovering a lot of that lost ground, so the sustainability of the price increases is somewhat guaranteed by a broad rise in mining costs.

Therefore, I believe OZL will be able to offset the rise in costs to a large extent with the current rise in commodity prices, which look to trying to form a more solid and sustainable price floor. As for production quotas, sometimes you gotta slow down in order to speed up.