http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/mining-energy/sundance-t...

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/mining-energy/sundance-to-finliase-offtake-finance-agreements-by-year-end/story-e6frg9df-1225925231881

Sundance to finliase offtake, finance agreements by year-end
David Fickling Dow Jones Newswires September 17, 2010 10:52AM

SUNDANCE Resources expects to arrange offtake contracts and project finance for its Mbalam iron ore project by the end of the year.

In an interview released to the Australian Securities Exchange today, Chairman George Jones said that talks with strategic partners are "well advanced" and foundation agreements with steel mills would be in place by the end of 2010, allowing construction work to begin next year.

The company has resources of 415 million tonnes of hematite ore and 2.3 billion tonnes of itabirite - a lower -grade variety of iron ore common in Brazil - at its tenements along the border between the central African countries of Cameroon and Republic of Congo.

The project is dependent on the construction of a 450km railway line and port at Lolabe in Cameroon.

Sundance shares have risen more than 50 per cent since it announced a memorandum of understanding with China-Africa Construction on September 8, entering discussions to build the railway line, while a separate port deal with China Harbour Engineering was signed on September 14.