– Natural Resources Minister

DESPITE a slight decline in gold production in 2022, Guyana has seen significant exploration activities, signalling an increase in gold production going forward.

The country’s Natural Resources Minister, Vickram Bharrat, disclosed while appearing recently on a weekly programme, ‘The Guyana Dialogue.’

“We have had significant exploration activity ongoing in Guyana for gold… OMAI [OMAI Gold Mines] is back in Guyana and has expended over US$40 million in exploration activities, discovering about 200 million ounces of gold deposits” the minister underscored.

Further, other large-scale gold mining companies, such as Reunion Gold have discovered 500 million ounces of gold. At the same time, Aris Mining Corporation stated that its Toroparu acquisition represents an estimated 5.4 million ounces of gold.

The minister added that “These are all new deposits that have been discovered and what we will see in another two to three years from now is maybe another two or three more large-scale gold mining companies operating in Guyana.”

On the other hand, the decline in gold production in 2022 was caused by COVID-19, which devastated the Australian mining company – Troy Resources.

Due to its employees’ inability to work, the company suffered a significant loss in operation and production time, forcing it to close its doors.

Meanwhile, the Aris mining team has confirmed that Toroparu is a large-scale gold-copper deposit with a measured and indicated resource estimate of 118,000 tonnes of copper as well as an inferred resource estimate of 1.2 million ounces of gold.

In addition, Reunion Gold Inc. acquired the Oko West Project, which comprises one Prospecting Licence issued on September 23, 2022. The licence is valid for three years and has a surface area of approximately 10,890 acres.

The natural resources minister said despite the setbacks caused by the pandemic and excessive flooding in the interior in 2021 and 2022, “We are resilient and we have been working with the miners to increase production.”