UK mining Company Bezant has since the beginning of 2018 refocused towards the development of an international copper gold portfolio focused on the Mankayan project in Luzon.
In this period Bezant with its partner and MPSA holder Crescent Mining and Development Corporation ( “Crescent”) has:
Appointed a new Bezant management team led by Colin Bird and Laurence Read
Incoming Chairman of Bezant, Colin Bird, is founder and chairman of the highly successful Jubilee Metals, one of the UK’s most profitable independent metals companies and oversaw the exploration of the Kalumbila copper project in Zambia, which was sold to First Quantum for $260m. Alongside him Laurence Read was appointed as CEO, who has a track regard in a major independent mine development financing and transaction.
With Crescent reassessed the extensive historical project data
This has included site visits with strategic groups undertaking new, independent geological and engineering assessments, extensive relogging of historical drill data, creation of a fly through graded model of the resource and culminated in an economic report published in February 2019. Asked in Manilla recently for the rationale behind the strategic change towards Mankayan and the Philippines Laurence Read, CEO, said “Changing copper market dynamics means Mankayan is ready to be a standalone, underground mine and our focus is on delivering that. Copper is about to see a major upheaval in price due to demand issues and the Mankayan project is a tier 1 asset which you can drive directly to from Manilla airport.“
The Mankayan project has grid power access, infrastructure, a highly skilled work force and as a block cave underground mine with a long life is not affected by the current Philippine restrictions on open pit mining.
Over the last ten years the world copper supply shortage and improvements in mining techniques have meant that sustainable mining grades have fallen from 1% plus copper equivalent to slightly over 0.6% in just a decade. This means Mankayan with a life of mine copper equivalent grade of 0.63% to 0.65% depending on mining strategy is an attractive
proposition with a Snowden resource estimate defining an indicated resource of 1.1 million tonnes of contained copper and 3.7 million ounces of contained gold and an inferred resource of 0.2 million tonnes of contained copper and 0.6 million ounces of contained gold.
Highlights of the new independent economic study by Mining Plus released in February 2019 are
11 different mining strategies modelled
For the first time, a Sub-Level Caving (“SLC”) ‘stepping stone’ scenario, with two main Block Caving (“BC”) routes identified for progression, with life of mine production grade in excess of 0.64% copper equivalent (“CuEq”).
Various sub $19/t cost options
The study focused on delivering the project into production with highly robust copper equivalent production grade, with a high gold content and uniformly sub $19/t costs. The three main representative options summarized below, are taken from the 11 modelled (the option numbers being those used in the study)
Asked what lay ahead in 2019 Laurence Read said; “We have a lot of important strategic decisions to make but what we aren’t worrying about is the copper and the gold in the ground or that this will be major mine for the Philippines. Picking the right path for the mid to long term is key for Crescent and Bezant, but whoever we work with to develop this mine will have access to significant amounts of physical, cost effective, copper and gold from Mankayan production and will be able to command a major strategic advantage in the global metals space for the next forty years.
