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Bezant looking to go deeper at Choco to access higher grade platinum and gold

Published: 09:42 29 Sep 2017 BST

choco project colombia
The first kilo of gold and platinum from the project was sold earlier this month

Bezant Resources PLC (LON:BZT) is working on accessing the deeper levels of its Choco platinum and gold project in Colombia where it expects to find “higher grades”.

The miner pumped in more than £1mln into the project during the first half to get the project up and running, with first production and sales achieved over the past month or so.

READ: Bezant sells first kilo of gold and platinum from Choco

In the six months ended 30 June – before Choco was generating any revenues – Bezant recorded a loss before tax of £1.01mln.

Since the end of the period, pit development work has been undertaken to allow the company to access the ‘virgin’ higher-grade lower level gravels and it expects to be in a position to process those gravels by mid-October.

In early July, Bezant also raised £585,000 which was used to support it into first, full, regular production at Choco.

Solid ground work in first half

"During the period under review, we undertook the necessary preparations to enable the commencement of gold-platinum recovery operations at the group's wholly owned Choco Project in Western Colombia,” said chief executive Bernard Olivier said in a statement.

“Following this solid ground work, involving the commitment of over £1 million to the project's operations during the first half of 2017, Bezant is now successfully mining gold and platinum in Colombia.”

He added: “Our first precious metals have been sold and we are currently seeking to access the deeper levels of alluvial gravels where significantly higher grades are expected to be encountered.”

As for the HGE-082 licence area which is nearby to the main FKJ-083 licence, Bezant said the exploration programme is ongoing with results expected in the final quarter of this year.

Bezant shares were down 3.5% to 1.36p in early deals.

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