JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) - Aim-listed Pangea DiamondFields will place its Bakerville project, in Gauteng, on care-and-maintenance until the mining right, which will allow for full-scale exploitation of the deposit, has been approved.

Pangea said on Monday that the mining right application had been completed and submitted to the relevant governmental authority in South Africa. It noted, however, that it was not possible to determine when the mining right would be approved and consequently, when commercial scale mining might start.

Pangea stated that it would undertake all preparatory work to ensure that upon approval, the transition to commercial scale operations was not unduly delayed.

Exploration would continue, targeted to delineate additional resource potential outside the current resource area and all remaining carats would be sold in due course.

“The results from the Bakerville project continue to encourage management and this latest update to the resource sees the economics of the project improve further,” said Pangea CEO Brett Thompson.

“While we do not wish to slow the momentum at Bakerville, it is a statutory requirement that we await the relevant authorisation before scaling the project up to its full potential. We remain in a strong position with the Bakerville project ready for development, an improved resource and the relatively low inherent operating risk present in South Africa.”

Meanwhile, Pangea has sold a third batch of diamonds from its Bakerville project.

The sale yielded an average price of $238/ct from a run-of-mine parcel of 796 ct. To date, over 2 000 ct have been sold by tender from Bakerville at a weighted average price of $366/ct.

“This sale is significant as the cumulative carats recovered and sold now exceed the minimum parcel size required in order to determine an average valuation for resource purposes in the indicated category,” the company said in a statement.

In the company's most recently published resource statement for Bakerville, an inferred resource of 3,59-million m3 and 122 500 ct was declared at an average recovered grade of 3,42 ct/100 m3.

As a result of additional sampling work since this resource estimate as well as the cumulative sale of the requisite parcel of diamonds for valuation purposes, the resource statement has now been updated and increased by 370% to 455 000 ct at a similar recovered grade of 3,42 ct/100m3.

Further, following the most recent sale, confidence in the quality of the resource has increased with the inclusion of 2,50-million m3 and 85 600 ct of indicated resources in the overall resource.

A feasibility study of the project has now been successfully completed in-house with positive results. The project scope at full production reflects a nominal capacity of 90 000 m2 of on site gravel mined and processed a month, producing around 2 250 ct a month at a cost of about $4,50/m2 or about $180/ct at the envisaged nominal capacity.