JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – Aim-listed Premier African Minerals has secured £1-million from investment company Darwin Strategic to part fund the development of its 49%-owned RHA Tungsten project in Zimbabwe.
Premier and Darwin signed an agreement on February 2 for the £1-million zero coupon senior unsecured convertible loan notes.
Commercial production at RHA was expected to start by June.
"Premier [will] mobilise civil construction and road upgrades and [start] construction management contracts this week. Additional finance of $2-million will still be required to meet the budgeted cash flow shortfall to commercial production.
“Premier anticipates that the bulk of this will be secured as asset finance against the plant and power generation equipment on order and under manufacture," CEO George Roach said.
The RHA project is located in an area of historic production, about 270 km north-west of Bulawayo. Premier was targeting a compliant indicated resource of up to ten-million tonnes at a grade of 0.12% to 0.17% tungsten trioxide (WO3) and 86 000 t at 2.25% WO3.
The project was expected to process 8 000 t/m of run-of-mine ore and produce, on average, 92 t/m of concentrate at 63% WO3 over a 22-month period.