28th Oct 2005 09:42
Namibian Resources PLC28 October 2005 Namibian Resources Plc (the "Company")28th October 2005 AGM Statement At the Company's annual general meeting to be held today, the Company's ChiefExecutive Officer, Tony Carlton will make the following statement: I visited our alluvial diamond mine a week ago in the company of our consultantgeologist Dr Donald Sutherland in order to (1) Review our current mining operations in relation to equipment.(2) To assess the current West Saltztal mining area and likely production.(3) To identify future areas for a mining plan for 2006 and to create an ongoing sampling programme. Valuable assistance was provided by Namdeb geologists and future mining targetsadjacent to our current mining were identified. All equipment was found to beoperating satisfactorily although intermittent winds of 90km an hour have causedsome downtime. The nature of the material currently being mined is verydifficult to process but a throughput of between 40 and 70 tons an hour is beingachieved. This will increase to about 120 tons an hour when drier product isprocessed in future outside of the West Saltztal salt pan. This will applyparticularly to the East Saltztal where historic sampling has indicated anaverage stone size of .75 carats. Tests will now be carried out on this futuremining target to assess volume and grade (carats per 100 tons). I had a verypositive meeting with the Minister of Mines and Energy. Promising areas foradditional concessions have been identified and negotiations for acquisitionsare ongoing. For commercial reasons I am unable to identify these prospects butwill advise shareholders when any agreement is concluded. SALTZTAL WEST Of the original diamond resource, based on historic sampling some 350m along -valley remain to be mined. The average sampling grade of this remaining groundis 19 carats per 100 tons across a deposit average width of around 12m. Thesefigures, if realised during mining, imply that 1200 carats remain to beproduced. The original resource, identified within a 1200m valley length,including the above 350m, was estimated at 4200ct. However, mining to date hasalready produced 4,197 carats and has demonstrated that the width across-valleyof the diamond - bearing material had been underestimated by the historicsampling. Moreover, much of the bedrock floor in the area already mined stillretains a thin cover of diamond - bearing gravel which, must be recovered andprocessed before the ground can be rehabilitated. This gravel veneer willprovide additional production to that already achieved from the area mined. Itis therefore apparent that diamond production from the length of valleyoriginally identified as diamond - bearing will substantially exceed the initialresource estimate. The average diamond size of the production however, at .59carat stone is as originally estimated and shows little variation along thevalley. Prospecting trenches have been opened farther along the valley todetermine whether the diamond - bearing material continues beyond the originallyestimated resource area. The remaining area is approximately 2km long. Amining plan for 2006 is being completed and tests on the Saltztal East willshortly be undertaken where historic sampling has indicated an average stonesize of .75 carats. Production Saltztal West 6 Months to 31st August 2005 3,276 carats average size .59March & April 2005 886 carats average size .53September 1st to 24th October 920 carats average size .61Financial year to 24th October 4,197 carats average size .59 A further progress report will be given in late December. A C A CarltonChief Executive Officer EnquiriesTelephone: 020 8726 0900Fax: 020 8726 0880Email: [email protected] This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock ExchangeRelated Shares:
NBR.L