The share price of Kibo Mining rose by more than 11% in Johannesburg last week on the prospect of a commenced definitive feasibility study opening the way for early gold production at the company’s Imweru prospect, in Tanzania.

The six-year-old Aim- and AltX-listed exploration and development company, which is also advancing the 300 MW mouth-of-mine thermal power development at the company’s Rukwa coal deposit, in Tanzania, has other projects in the Lake Victoria area, eastern Tanzania and the Mtwara Corridor in southern Tanzania.

Headed by CEO Louis Coetzee, the company said in a Johannesburg Stock Exchange News Service announcement that Imweru, in the Lake Victoria area, holds sufficient existing compliant gold resources to support production in the near to medium term, subject to the results of the study.

The Irish-registered mineral exploration and development company, which also has uranium and nickel resources, added that it had appointed the Africa-focused Minxcon project house to conduct the Imweru study in the next 12 months.

Hume Capital, which has described the 550 000 oz Imweru gold resource as adding a touch of glitter, said in a report earlier this year that the Korean East West Power Company had shown interest in Kibo’s Rukwa coal-to-power project, which is expected to cost from $500-million to $700-million and which is earmarked to feed electrical power into Tanzania’s national grid as an independent power producer.

Mining Weekly earlier this year also quoted a Tanzanian Ministry as expecting power and infrastructure projects to facilitate the go-ahead of other mining projects in the country.

Currently, Tanzania’s existing railway lines are being rehabilitated and upgraded to standard gauge, while additional plans include the construction of more berths to handle more containers, as well as developing the Mbegani port, in the Bagamoyo district north of Dar es Salaam, which will serve as a relief port to Dar es Salaam.

Energy plans include increasing power generation capacity from the 1 375 MW to more than 3 000 MW by 2015 with new railway lines envisaged including the Mtwara–Songea to Mbamba Bay line, with spurs to the Liganga and Mchuchuma sites, where new iron-ore and coal mines are being developed.

In addition, upgrading of the 690 km Dar es Salaam Isaka–Keza/Kigali–Gitega–Musongati line to a standard gauge is seen as having the potential to benefit the Kabanga nickel project, in the Ngara district of Tanzania’s Kagera region.