London- and Toronto-listed Endeavour Mining has reported its strongest year for exploration yet, adding three-million measured and indicated ounces to its flagship mines in West Africa – Ity, Houndé and Sabodala-Massawa.

The company says it is now well positioned to achieve its five-year discovery target of between 15-million and 20-million ounces of indicated resources, at a discovery cost of less than $25/oz, between 2021 and 2025.

Endeavour successfully completed its prior five-year discovery target of between 10-million and 15-million ounces of indicated resources.

The company explains that its exploration and resource estimate activities were prioritised at the flagship mines and the Fetekro property’s Lafigué deposit.

Particularly, the measured and indicated resources on this deposit grew by 18% year-on-year to 2.9-million ounces, while the inferred resources grew by 309% to 270 000 oz, which justifies a four-million-tonne-a-year plant for the definitive feasibility study (DFS), instead of a three-million-tonne-a-year plant as originally contemplated in the preliminary feasibility study.

The DFS should be completed by the end of this quarter.

Resource updates for all the other assets will be included in the year-end reserve and resource update, which will be published in March.

The measured and indicated resources for the Ity, Houndé and Sabodala-Massawa mines, located in Côte d'Ivoire, Burkina Faso and Senegal, respectively, increased by 26%, 20% and 11% year-on-year.

Endeavour president and CEO Sebastien de Montessus says the significant discoveries the company made showcase the strong exploration potential within its portfolio and continue to confirm West Africa as one of the world’s top regions for gold discoveries.

“Our exploration programme continues to add significant value to the business, creating the potential to extend mine lives to well beyond ten years, while feeding our development pipeline.

“At our Ity mine, we have added more than one-million ounces of resources. Looking ahead, work continues to convert the inferred resources into indicated status and pursue an aggressive exploration programme,” he notes.

De Montessus explains further that, at the Houndé mine, another significant discovery was made in 2021, with the Mambo deposit adding to the Kari Pump and Kari Centre discoveries.

The company will study the potential of bringing forward production at the project.