AMN - COTE D’IVOIRE: On target for first Ity gold in April

An Endeavour Mining Corporation continues to make excellent progress at its Ity CIL Gold Project in Côte d'Ivoire with wet commissioning underway. First gold is now expected to occur early in the June quarter, two months ahead of schedule.

Dry commissioning has been completed and demobilisation of the construction team has also commenced. Operating teams are in place with training programs well underway.

Ore is expected to be introduced into the process plant milling circuit in the coming days.

The company says construction is progressing on budget with more than 97% of the total project complete at February 20. More than 8 million man-hours have been worked without a lost time injury.

Ity is expected to produce 160,000 to 200,000 ounces of gold in 2019 at an AISC of $525-590 per ounce, with the bottom-end of production guidance corresponding to the nameplate capacity. The top-end factors possible upsides such as an earlier start date, a quicker than expected ramp-up and the plant producing above its nameplate.

The project remains on-budget with the remaining cash outflow for 2019 amounting to $50-60 million.

Endeavour's president and CEO Sébastien de Montessus said: "We are proud of the key milestones achieved in recent months as the project construction has been significantly de-risked. We are excited to have commenced the commissioning phase several months ahead of the initial schedule and look forward to the first gold pour in early Q2-2019.

"The start of production at Ity will be a transformative moment for Endeavour. It will become, alongside Houndé, our second flagship mine, and marks the end of several years of large capital-intensive projects which will allow us to focus on cash flow generation and generating returns on our capital employed.

"With seven drill rigs currently operating in the Le Plaque area, we expect our additional exploration activity to further demonstrate the potential of Ity."

An aggressive exploration program is underway, with seven drill rigs active on the La Plaque target with the aim of publishing an updated resource in the June quarter. For 2019, a total of 70,000-metres are planned to be drilled in the Le Plaque area and on other nearby targets.

Endeavour operates four mines across Côte d'Ivoire (Agbaou and Ity) and Burkina Faso (Houndé, Karma) which are expected to produce 615,000-695,000 ounces in 2019 at an AISC of $760-810 per ounce. 

www.endeavourmining.com