Tietto Minerals receives license for Abujar Gold Project

West African gold explorer and developer Tietto Minerals has received approval from Côte d’Ivoire’s Le Ministère des Mines, du Pétrole et de l’Energieh (Ministry of Mines, Petroleum and Energy) for a mining license for Tietto’s 3.02Moz Abujar Gold Project, paving the way for development of West Africa’s next gold mine.

In a statement, the company says its systemic exploration over the 70-kilometre strike of the Abujar Project’s three tenements has identified three mineralised gold corridors – the West Corridor, Central Corridor and East Corridor. In the Central Corridor, Tietto has defined an updated JORC Resource of 3.02Moz gold at Abujar over three deposits:

• AG (Abujar Gludehi): 49.6Mt at 1.5 g/t Au for 2.3Moz 
• APG (Abujar Pischon and Golikro): 31Mt at 0.7g/t Au for 0.7Moz 
• SG (South Gamina): 0.5Mt at 1.4g/t Au for 0.02Moz

The combined strike length of these three prospects accounts for approximately 10 percent of the overall strike length of the 70-kilometre mineralised Abujar gold corridor.

In total, the company says it has defined 33 gold prospects to date, including 20 gold prospects inside the mining license with gold resource upside to realise through ongoing diamond drilling.

Systematic drilling is underway to test the new prospects identified to date and it is planned to use six Company‐owned diamond drill rigs to complete this exploration drilling by Q3 2021, Tietto says in its statement.  

“Another milestone is secured following the grant of the Mining Licence for our 3.02Moz Abujar Gold Project. We are in the final leg of the permitting process (ESIA ‐ Environmental Approval secured in October 2020), with negotiations beginning on the terms and conditions of the Mining Convention and expect to conclude these discussions in the first half of 2021. Tietto’s Board recently approved expenditure to advance local site works and secure long‐lead items in anticipation of securing this final approval," said Dr Caigen Wang, Tietto managing director.

“Work on the Abujar PFS remains on track and we expect to deliver the results in Q1 CY21. Exploration drilling continues to ramp up following completion of the Côte d’Ivoire general election, and we look forward to reporting results in coming weeks and months from this aggressive program designed to grow Abujar gold resources at extremely low drilling costs. 

“The Company is well funded to deliver our dual‐track strategy and we continue to move closer to our goal of developing Abujar into West Africa’s next gold mine,” Wang adds.

“The Board and I would like to acknowledge and thank the Government of Côte d’Ivoire and its officers as well as local communities for the support shown to our team. We also wish to thank our team for their professionalism and work ethic that made this milestone possible.”

In it latest quarterly report, the company states it is "well positioned" to advance its dual strategy in 2021:

• Accelerate exploration to drive rapid resource growth New 70,000m diamond drilling program using its own 6 DD rigs drilling at US$35/m 
  Drill testing 8.5km of fertile Abujar main shear along strike from AG and  APG  Drill testing high priority regional targets  Artisanal workings dotted along 70km mineralised corridor 
• Fast tracking development of the Abujar Gold Project Growing 3.02 million ounce gold open pit opportunity 
  Feasibility study underway ‐ PFS in Q1 2021 and DFS expected Q3 2021  Clear pathway to development – permitting underway, near infrastructure 
  Well‐funded with over A$60M in cash