26 Jul 2013 07:00
Embargoed 7am 26 July 2013
Bellzone Mining plc
("Bellzone" or "the Company")
AGM Statement
Bellzone Mining plc (AIM: BZM) will be holding its Annual General Meeting today at 10.00 a.m. At the meeting, the Group's Chief Executive Officer, Glenn Baldwin, will provide the following statement:
Good morning Ladies and Gentlemen and welcome to the Bellzone Annual General Meeting.
We are delighted to be holding the AGM here this year following the relocation of our corporate office to Jersey. We are also delighted to welcome those shareholders who have travelled to the AGM and to those who are Jersey-based.
Firstly, I would like to draw your attention to the video which is playing and loaded on our website www.bellzone.com.
The video shows where the Company's key assets are located in the Republic of Guinea, West Africa. The footage then covers activities at Forécariah including load and haul equipment, the plant, truck haulage and port operations at Konta. It then moves on to Kalia showing the topography and remote drilling conditions, the geology operations and on-site preparatory lab, and concludes with Sadeka.
The Company achieved a number of objectives in 2012. The principal achievement was to commence production at the Forécariah JV with our partners CIF and ship the first iron ore from Guinea since 1966.
Bellzone also published a feasibility study on the oxide and magnetite mining for Kalia in July 2012 which showed that the project was attractive under specific circumstances with bulk infrastructure.
Since I joined Bellzone in September 2012, the maiden JORC statement for Forécariah and an updated JORC statement for Kalia which defined high grade oxide resources at surface have been released.
The Company updated shareholders on our JV production forecast in March and we remain on schedule to release the Kalia Optimisation Study to the market during this quarter. This study focusses on the extraction of the higher grade oxide resources for Kalia as a discrete, phase 1 project. It also provides part of the initial infrastructure solution for a possible future railway construction but the optimisation study is not dependent on a railway solution.
Turning to the production and shipping guidance at the Forécariah JV, a small number of retail shareholders often ask for regular updates on production and shipping figures. I can tell you that the production targets remain as outlined and we expect production at the JV to meet the 800,000-1 million tonnes March 2013 guidance.
The shipping targets are a little tighter. Over the past few months, we identified some management issues on site at the JV, including a delay to the final commissioning date of the wet processing plant and we are working to resolve these problems which have impacted on the shipping schedule. We do have a ship being loaded at the moment. We will continue to monitor the shipping targets carefully and if we believe the shipping targets are not achievable, we will advise the market accordingly.
To conclude, we are excited about the prospect of releasing the Kalia Optimisation Study and the resultant certainty that comes with a reserve statement verified by an independent JORC expert. Our cash balance is sufficient to see Bellzone through to H2, 2014 and there is no planned further capex now that all of the Kalia drilling for the upcoming Optimisation Study has been completed. We are working on and look forward to providing a funding solution for Kalia and growing shareholder value.
Enquiries:
Bellzone Mining plc
Peta Baldwin, Corporate Affairs +44 (0) 1534 513 500
Canaccord Genuity Limited
Nominated Adviser and Broker to Bellzone +44 (0)20 7523 8000
Andrew Chubb/Tarica Mpinga
Investec
Chris Sim/Neil Elliot +44 207 597 5970
Tavistock (UK)
Jos Simson/Mike Bartlett +44 (0)20 7920 3150 / +44 (0)7899 870 450
About Bellzone Mining Plc
Bellzone Mining plc is an exploration and resource development company with iron ore and nickel/copper permits in the Republic of Guinea, West Africa. Kalia Mine Project is the Company's flagship project with a globally significant magnetite resource of 4.63 billion tonnes and some 822 million tonnes of oxide and supergene banded iron formation.
The Forécariah iron ore mine commenced production in May 2012 and is a joint venture between Bellzone (50%) and China International Fund Limited (50%).