News: SBM St Barbara pulls production outlook as COVID hits Papua New Guinea mining ops

Feb 18 (Reuters) - Australian gold miner St Barbara Ltd (SBM) on Friday withdrew its production outlook for fiscal 2022, citing an outbreak of the Omicron variant of the coronavirus at its Simberi operations in Papua New Guinea (PNG) that has affected its workforce.

While gold production at Simberi operations continues, ramp-up of mining operations is not achieving target rates, the company said.

There were 139 active COVID-19 cases at Simberi as of Friday, roughly a quarter of its daily workforce of 600, St Barbara said, adding that the majority of those cases were asymptomatic with zero hospitalisation so far.

St Barbara's shares closed down 1.7% after the announcement after scaling as much as 4.3% earlier in the day.

"While we have experienced previous COVID-19 surges, this Omicron outbreak is proving to be far more disruptive," Chief Executive Officer Craig Jetson said.

The miner also warned that reduction in operation of commercial flights across PNG due to pilot shortage would impact its supplies and senior staff commutation. The mine and processing plant at Simberi continue to operate at reduced rate, it added.

St. Barbara had earlier https://stbarbara.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/2022.01.25-quarterly-report-q2-fy22.pdf flagged issues in sourcing labour and equipment for its Atlantic and Simberi operations, narrowing its 2022 production guidance to between 305 thousand ounces (koz) and 335 koz from earlier range of 305 koz to 355 koz.