TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – Midtier gold miner Iamgold this week declared commercial production at its Westwood mine in the Abitibi region of Quebec, effective from July 1.

Westwood is part of the Doyon-Bousquet-LaRonde (DBL) mining camp. The DBL mining camp hosts two world-class deposits – the Doyon and LaRonde-Penna mines – and is by far the largest gold/copper/zinc/silver-producing district in Quebec.

The company said the mine hoisted ore at an average rate of 1 075 t/d for the first 30 days of July.

While the gold processing plant at the Westwood mine started processing in March last year, the Westwood mine was now hoisting ore at a sustained level to sufficiently feed the processing plant to enable profitable production.

Accordingly, the Westwood mine is considered an operating mine and will no longer be accounted for as a development project. Effective July 1, Westwood's contribution from sales of ounces produced will be recorded in the consolidated statement of earnings and will no longer be netted against capital expenditures.

"This is a significant accomplishment for the Westwood team and a pivotal achievement for Iamgold. We not only met this milestone in the third quarter as promised, but achieved commercial production at the very beginning of the quarter – a testament to the hard work and commitment of the Westwood team,” Iamgold president and CEO Steve Letwin said.

Transitioning from the successful operational history of the Doyon and Mouska mines, the company expected the Doyon division to produce from 100 000 oz to 120 000 oz of gold this year, including the final output from Mouska and both commercial and precommercial production from Westwood.

“We will ramp up production during the second half of the year and expect Westwood's total cash costs to trend down through the period and average between $750/oz and $850/oz produced,” Letwin pointed out.

Iamgold SVP and COO Gordon Stothart said the mine would continue the company’s 30-year legacy of underground mining in the Abitibi region.

"The development and operations teams have worked together well and are achieving excellent mine development rates over 1 400 m/m. From the initiation of exploration in 2002 to December 2013, 540 484 m of diamond drilling has been completed at Westwood, during which the overall resource estimate has been very stable and the average grade has steadily increased.

“This gives us a high degree of confidence in the future of this mine. With the mine still in its early days of commercial production we continue to evaluate various production profiles to optimise and get the best economic return from the processing of Westwood's mineral resource,” Stothart explained.

Profiles under study currently range from producing a life-of-mine (LoM) average of 165 000 oz/y to 180 000 oz/y at LoM average cash costs between $630/oz and $690/oz produced.

While production is ramping up, the Westwood plant will use its spare capacity to process up to 192 000 t of ore yearly from the neighbouring Gold Bullion mine, owned by Gold Bullion Development Corp.