Savannah Resources upbeat on Mutamba mineral estimate

(ShareCast News) - Savannah Resources said results of its mineral resource estimate of the Jangamo and Dongane deposits in the Mutamba project underscored it as one of the largest ilmenite-dominant, mineral sands accumulations on the east coast of Africa.The AIM-quoted outfit said this was a major milestone for the company and consortium partner Rio Tinto."While we are delighted with the outcome, what it really means is that we now have an exceptional foundation for our scoping study of the project," said chief executive David Archer in a statement."The scoping study will focus on the areas of mineral occurrence which are most prospective in terms of size and grade, with little to no overburden factors, which should facilitate simple, low cost mining," Archer added.Savannah believed there was an excellent opportunity to potentially define an initial phase, low-capital expenditure, long-life, dry mining project of about a 200Mt well-graded resource, associated with a series of reworked coastal dunes.The estimate revealed an initial indicated and inferred mineral resource estimate of 3.5bn tonnes at 3.8% total heavy minerals.It contained 81m tonnes (Mt) of ilmenite, 2.2Mt rutile and 3.8Mt zircon. Savannah added that 52% of mineral resource was in the indicated category, with 48% in the inferred category.At about 11:20 GMT, shares in Savannah were up 2.86% to 4.5p.