The fate of Ghana’s Asanko gold mine (AGM) will be decided by Gold Fields (JSE, NYSE: GFI) over the next four months, the company stated on Wednesday.
According to interim CEO Martin Preece in an interview with Bloomberg, the South African gold miner is actively evaluating “all potential avenues” for the mine, including the prospect for a full divestiture or an increase in its ownership position.
With the help of their partnership in 2018, Gold Fields and Galiano Gold (TSX: GAU) of Canada were able to manage the AGM, which produced an astounding 170,342 ounces of gold in the previous year.Although Galiano, the mine’s operator, expects Asanko’s production to fall this year to anywhere between 120,000 and 130,000 ounces, it is ready to introduce a new mining approach.
According to a 2023 feasibility assessment, Asanko’s productive life can be prolonged by 8.5 years, and starting in 2025, annual gold output is expected to double from the 2023 forecast of 100,000–120,000 ounces to 250,000 ounces.
AGM is a multi-deposit complex that includes many satellite deposits throughout the Asankrangwa gold belt, a 5Mtpa carbon-in-leach processing facility, and four main open-pit mining sites: Abore, Miradani North, Nkran, and Esaase.
The smallest asset owned by Gold Fields in Ghana is this mine complex. The company and AngloGold Ashanti reached an agreement in March to consolidate the country’s adjacent Tarkwa and Iduapriem mines, creating Africa’s largest gold mine.
Gold Fields and AngloGold will each control 60% and 30% of this joint venture, with the Ghanaian government holding the remaining 10%.
As stated jointly by both firms during the agreement, the combined activities are estimated to produce an average of 900,000 ounces per year during the first five years and roughly 600,000 ounces over the anticipated 18-year lifespan of the mine.
Gold Fields, like its rival AngloGold Ashanti, has transferred its attention from its home country to more profitable mining projects in Ghana, Australia, and the Americas.
The South Deep mine in South Africa is still run by the gold miner, which Cecil John Rhodes started in 1887, although mining there has grown more difficult because of the complicated geology involved in extracting gold from the deepest deposits in the world.