KUALA LUMPUR: Borneo Oil Bhd (BornOil) group is set to 'strike gold' with its Bukit Ibam mining venture as the company intends to proceed with excavation and mining on the first Zone of Bukit Ibam in Pahang.
BornOil in a filing to Bursa Malaysia yesterday said the site is believed to contain total resources of 22,200 ounces or 621,917 grams of gold in 1.66 million metric tons of ore with an average grade of 0.42 g/t.
The findings was also affirmed by Dr Yves Cheze, a member of the Australian Institute of Geoscientists as well as the Institute Geology Malaysia.
Dr Yves has also recommended BornOil group to develop the exploration of not only the immediate extension of the first zone but also in several other zones in the mining area that have similar geology as they may hold significant potential for additional gold resources.
To recap, back in May 2010, an exclusive agreement had been inked between Perbadanan Kemajuan Negeri Pahang (PKNP) and HDL Global Sdn Bhd (HDL) for the prospecting and mining rights to an area covering 1,200 hectares within Hutan Simpan Bukit Ibam in Pahang.
Subsequently, in March 2015, BornOil via an exclusive production sharing agreement with HDL, was granted the sole and exclusive right to prospect, explore, mine, extract, process, sell and collect all revenue of sales with respect to all minerals and precious metals including gold over the said area.
Currently, an area measuring approximately 462 acres within the area has been issued with a mining lease on which the BornOil is currently carrying out mining works.
The mining area, in turn, is divided into eight zones on which the BornOil group has been conducting detailed exploration works.
At the conclusion of Phase 1 and Phase 2 of the preliminary exploration works on seven of the eight zones, an assessment of potential gold resources dated March 2019 was prepared by Dr Yves showing potential gold resources of 60,032 ounces or 1,866,943 gm (1.866 ton) of gold.
BornOil is also continuing with exploration works on the other seven zones at an interval of three to six months for each zone.
Gold prices have been on the rise, and, for the first time, breached the US$2,000 an ounce mark a few days ago.