K50mil set for mine exploration

Reports by PETER ESILA
K92 MINING Limited spent more than K30 million on exploration last year and has K50 million budgeted for this year for exploration at its gold mine in Kainantu, Eastern Highlands, an official says.
K92 chief executive officer John Lewins said its stage three expansion was expected to be commissioned in 2024.
“Current exploration makes K92 the largest explorer in PNG,” he said.
“In terms of our stage three expansion, we were looking at commissioning the expansion in 2024 and will achieve full production in 2025. This will result in a tripling of our production to 350,000 ounces (oz), with a similar threefold increase in corporate tax (K250 million per year) and royalty payments (K40 to K50 million per year), while salary wages tax will also increase with a doubling of the number of people employed on the operation.”
Lewins added that this would all depend of a favourable gold price.
He said K92 production growth over the last four years since commercial production started included in 2018 (47,000ozs), 2019 (82,000ozs), 2020 (99,000ozs), 2021 (104,000ozs) and planned production for 2022 was 125,000ozs to 140,000ozs.
“Completion of our stage two expansion in 2021 which doubled throughput to 400,000 tonnes per annum and planned further stage 2A expansion due to be commissioned in the third quarter this year which increases throughput to 500,000 tonnes per annum.
“Planning and execution of stage three expansion, which will involve capital expenditure of over K1 billion over the next three years (K300 million in 2022), will increase the throughput at Kainantu to 1.2 million tonnes per annum and increase production to 350,000ozs per year, making the Kainantu gold mine a world class mine.”