Perth-based Gindalbie Gold NL, which made its mark with the Two Boys gold mine near Kalgoorlie, is progressing towards commissioning a full feasibility into developing a stand-alone mill on its Minjar project in the South Murchison mineral fields.
The project is situated on the edge of the wheatbelt about 350 kilometres north north east of Perth and a few kilometres from Normandy Mining Ltd’s Golden Grove zinc mine.
As one of the few remaining juniors with a gold project in the pre-feasibility stage, Gindalbie bought an advanced gold resource from Normandy surrounding the Golden Grove mine with 400,000 ounces in the inferred and indicated category for $2.5 million.
Gindalbie managing director David McSweeney said: “In our first drilling campaign, as part of our pre-feasibility studies, we were successful in upgrading two of the resources to reserves and discovering two high-grade resources at depth.
“We are well on the way to commissioning a full feasibility into the development of a stand-alone mill on site.”
He said the most impressive thing about the project was the high-grade nature of the resources some of which grade 3 grams/tonne to 4g/t.
“The Murchison goldfields might be the last frontier for the junior gold miners with ourselves, Equigold about 150 kilometres north, Hill 50 some 200km away, St Barbara further north and Troy to the east,” Mr McSweeney said.
“We are pushing ahead with our development plans. We have had a lot of interest from the debt markets – more so than from the equity markets.”
He noted that a project like Minjar was rare in Australia nowadays.
“It used to be that the standard growth strategy for a junior was to acquire an advanced project from a major,” Mr McSweeney said.
“With intense competition for ground and the rationalisation of the industry in recent years. these types of opportunities have dried up.
“We believe the only reason we were able to acquire this project is because there are no other operating gold mines in the South Murchison,” he said.
