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Zanaga Iron confirms huge reserves at flagship

Published: 16:45 30 Sep 2014 AEST

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Zanaga Iron (LON:ZIOC) has tweaked the reserves at its huge deposit in the Republic of Congo to reflect the revised plans for its development.

The new plan is to exploit the deposit in two stages, with initial production of 12mtpa eventually rising to 30mtpa.

As this will mean less ore being mined overall, the deposit now has a proved reserve of 770mln tonnes or iron at 37.3% Fe, sufficient for the nine years of production expected during stage one.

Including probable reserves, the total is 2,070 Mt at 33.9%, enough to support a 30 year life of mine. The reserves are derived from an estimated resource at Zanaga of 6,900Mt 32% Fe.

Though reduced, the proved iron ore reserve is the largest in Africa and would underpin the Stage One project on a standalone basis for more than 25 years, said Zanaga.

“The significant scale of the ore reserve supports the company's confidence in the quality of the Zanaga project and is indicative of the rigorous standard that has been applied to all study work conducted to date.”

The project is a joint venture with mining titan Glencore (LON:GLEN) with the cost of the first stage of the project estimated at US$2.5-3bn. Transportation will be through a slurry pipeline.

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