mining news . offtake agreement with in a week

Ben Sharples
Friday, 8 September 2006

AIM Resources' flagship Perkoa zinc project in Burkina Faso could be in production early next year, with a review of the mining method likely to reduce the time to production by about 12 months.

AIM Resources' Perkoa zinc-silver deposit in Burkina Faso

Addressing delegates at the Africa Downunder Conference in Perth yesterday, AIM managing director Marc Flory said the company was reviewing the mining method and would likely move away from accessing the ore body via a shaft and decline and concentrate solely on a decline approach.

"We were aiming for a 2008 start but this decision will allow that to be brought forward by a minimum six months but nearer to 12 months on Perkoa," Flory said.

Under the proposed plan, AIM will increase the size of the boxcut from 10m to 25m, which would allow the company to access mineable ore "almost immediately".

"Our initial rate will be 500,000 tonnes per annum but we have the capacity at Perkoa – and with changes proposed by DRA [Mineral Projects] to lift that in a short time to 650,000t, with a high recovery rate annually of 65,000t of zinc concentrate," Flory said.

AIM is also investigating moving away from mining utilising sub-level uphole retreat and cut and fill methods, and concentrating on uphole bench stoping. Flory conceded the revised plan would likely add to the capital costs of $US100 million ($A131 million).

In addition, Flory said the company had been in discussions with two smelters and metals trading company "with a presence in West Africa" and an offtake announcement would be made within a week.

Perkoa has a reserve of 6.3 million tonnes at 14.5% for 900,000t of zinc and has a mine life of about 14 years.

DRA Mineral Projects has the engineering, procurement, construction and management contract for Perkoa and Byrnecut Mining has been appointed the construction and mining contractor for the operation
_ebit