PERTH (miningweekly.com) – Gold miner Troy Resources on Friday told shareholders that a restart of operations at the Karouni gold project, in Guyana, would be dependent on a number of factors, including securing additional funding.

Troy in October this year suspended operations at Karouni following a fatality at the mine, and the issue of a Cease Work Order from the Ministry of Social Protection forcing a cease on all mining and milling activities.

While the Cease Work Order was rescinded earlier this month, after investigations did not find any cause against Troy or its safety practices, the miner was yet to restart operations at Karouni.

Troy on Friday told shareholders that with gold production at the Smarts 3 pit proving to be problematic in the short, term, denying Troy its anticipated primary source of mill feed for the next 12 months, it was necessary for the Ohio Creek deposit to be incorporated into the mine planning, with Troy saying the deposit was "integral to any restart planning".

While an application for a mining permit at Ohio Creek was made some time ago, the company was still awaiting the grant of this permit.

Troy in October announced that it had encountered further wall stability issues, which, in part, related to the high rainfall received during the last wet season. While the company had intended to finish the cutback and complete mining ore before the start of the next wet season, the current delay in mining activities meant that Troy would be unable to complete the remaining cutback before the onset of the wet weather.

The miner said that while planning for this was still under way, it would be prudent from both a safety and financial perspective to not undertake any further work on the Smarts 3 pit until after the wet season, after which an assessment would be made on the effect that the rainfall had on the pit during this period.

Troy warned that the change to the timing of any future mining at Smarts 3 would have a significant impact on the ore mined and gold produced at Karouni.

Furthermore, Troy said that the company would also need to resolve concerns around the importation of certain goods without the imposition of value-added tax, as part of a Minerals Agreement signed between Troy and the government of Guyana.

The miner said that the re-issuance of this was critical as the supplies were currently at the wharf in Guyana and were not only required on-site, but were incurring unnecessary demurrage and storage costs.

Meanwhile, the miner has been forced to retrench just over 200 workers at Karouni, as its six-week permitted stand-down period was approaching.

The miner said that when a decision to restart the operations had been made, Troy would be able to preferentially offer employment to former employees.

The company said that while it was keen to restart the operations "as soon as practicable" the outstanding matters would need to be resolved. Additionally, the company also said that it had assessed that it would need to source additional funding to enable operations to continue through the start-up process.