Here's a story from 1995. I know it's old but they still have the property and some big investors want in.
Bolivian TIMES
Front Page Article, October 20, 1995.
by Erb Burns-Ardell
At the international mining conference being held in La Paz the
week of October 23, two mining exploration companies are
poised to announce what, they say, could turn out to be the
largest gold find in Latin America in the last decade.
Bolivian based Excalibur and Canadian Eaglecrest
Explorations have laid claim to some 7,000 hectares of mining
rights in the area of San Simon in Beni Department. The two
have earned out exploration activities on only ten percent of the
7,000 hectares, but claim to have already uncovered proven
reserves of one million ounces of gold. If the rest of the area pans
out as they expect, the land these two companies have mining
rights to could produce upwards of ten million ounces of gold,
rivaling the famous Venezuelan Placer Dom project, Kilometer
88. One million ounces is the magic number mining companies
look for to begin large scale drilling. The current market price of
gold is US $385 per Ounce.
Either way, the find would prove an unexpected windfall for the
Bolivian government and the region around San Simon. The
state earns roughly 30 percent in taxes on mining profits, as well
as an additional ten to 12 percent on any imported machinery.
Exploitation of the full 7,000 hectares would require massive
importation of heavy mining equipment.
Ironically, the find is in an area where gold was first discovered
by the Jesuits in the 17th century. Rough terrain, isolation,
limited extraction technologies and a chronic lack of security
however, limited mining in the area in the past. The region where
Excalibur and Eaglecrest claim to have made their find is 30 km
from the town of Remanso, on the Rio Itenez, which forms the
border with Brazil.
The San Simon area lies in a humid savanna type subdivision of
the tropical Amazonias. According to Jean Marc Tesseire,
Excalibur's executive president, the region in which their find and
claims are located is an upraised plateau with very little
vegetation. "The soil in the area has a very high natural arsenic
content so there's no vegetation," he says.
Currently the area is being exploited illegally by Brazilian gold
pirates that cross the border and work under the protection of
local authorities. An estimated 2 kg of gold is lost each day to
illegal Brazilian exploitation, (US $4 million a year).
According to Teisseire, this is the largest find in Bolivia in the
last half-decade, despite larger exploration activities and
significant investment. To date Eaglecrest and Excalibur say they
have invested US $600,000 in the area and have a budget of US
$2 million for 1996.
Teisseire says the find is "excellent news for Bolivia. It will mean
very important investment in the country." Investment which, he
says, Bolivia had been losing out on to Peru, Ecuador and
Argentina in recent years.
To fully develop this new mining district will take an estimated
US $200 to US $800 million. Eaglecrest is looking at
investments of between US $200 and US $300 million.
For this part of the Beni, the find will also mean jobs and
infrastructure according to Teisseire. "The area is very isolated.
It needs good roads, sanitation facilities and other infrastructure.
All this will be provided by the mining company that develops the
area." He adds that this development "will also mean
employment for people in the area, who's production possibilities
have been more or less exhausted."
Excalibur and Eaglecrest are not the only companies pursuing
gold in the region. According to Teisseire, an estimated 48,000
hectares of mining rights have been filed in the San Simon area in
the last year alone. Teisseire says they have been carrying out
"semi-clandestine exploration, since we didn't want to announce
to the world that there was rich gold deposits until everything
was settled." By "settled," Teisseire is referring to the
consolidation of their mining option over several adjoining areas.
Teisseire says they've taken samples only as far down as 80
meters, but he expects that gold content could go much Sleeper.
Moore, of rival DA CAPO, insists that with these limited types of
sampling there's just no way to know for certain what kind of
deposits are present.
The next stage for Excalibur and Eaglecrest, a relatively small
mining company, is to bring in drilling and excavating machinery
requiring larger capital investments than have been made to date.
A step which Teisseire says they won't take until a number of
issues have been resolved.
The most important of these is the lack of security and general
lawlessness that prevails in the region. According to Teisseire,
"Garimpeiros, Brazilians associated with pseudo-cooperatives,
exploit the property without any kind of permission from the
legal owners. They run geologists off their legitimate claims with
sticks of dynamite, defy legal owners, and assault and take
hostage the Bolivian police trying to restore order. "We can't
proceed until this problem is ironed out. It will undoubtedly be
remedied by the Bolivian government. There's no reason that an
opportunity of this magnitude should he ruined."
Teisseire is currently negotiating with So-called cooperatives in
the area, but he has little hope that this will offer a long-term
solution "No agreement is binding unless you have something to
back it up, he says. He says, however, that "it's in the
government's interests to establish control over this area, not just
for the gold mining potential, but because it's a border zone and
because of the old tradition of narco-trafficking activity." For
their part, the owners of the two companies are prepared to give
jobs to all the Bolivian workers in the zone, but within a legal
framework.
Whatever the end result, Eaglecrest and Excalibur's
announcement is helping to put Bolivia back on the gold mining
map. Except for the Kori Kollo mine near Oruro which last year
was the largest gold producer in South America, and the Don
Mario project east of Santa Cruz, mining in the country has
concentrated much more heavily on tin and silver.
The mining meeting to begin October 23 is perhaps a portent of
Bolivia's future in mining. Sources say the meeting is likely to
focus on gold, rather than the two old standards. The meeting is
expected to invigorate the process of mining exploration in
Bolivia-an area which many feel is an untapped gold mine.
Zeev, call Tom Brady at 604-682-1555 and he can answer all those important questions you have.
Mr Metals |
