Cranswick says gold, diamond and base metals prospecting is ongoing after the company secured US$16 million in November last year. The mining company will soon be making announcements to the extent of mineral resources, hinting the London securities exchange mining junior’s Blue Rock prospect would add value to ACR’s portfolio.“We have made steady progress over the past five months, particularly in regard to the continued drilling programmes at the Blue Rock gold discovery,” said Cranswick. “We expect to be in a position to announce a maiden Australasian Joint Ore Resource Committee (JORC) resource on the Blue Rock prospect soon which we believe will add further tangible value to our portfolio.” JORC is an internationally accepted internal reporting standard used by a number of major mining companies to provide a minimum standard for reporting of exploration results.This is also used to ensure that public reports on these matters contain all the information investors and their advisers “require for the purpose of making a balanced judgment regarding the results and estimates being reported”. ACR, which is fighting a legal battle over diamond claims in Marange, Mutare, said it is working on other areas to grow its portfolio.Zimbabwe’s mining industry was almost at a standstill last year save for a few mines, especially the platinum and diamond ones, which continued to operate.Efforts to rebound mining and production are being undertaken by the Zimbabwe Electricity Transmission and Distribution Company (ZETDC), a subsidiary of Zesa Holdings which is negotiating with about fifty large power users.If the negotiations are successful, the heavy power users would be protected from load shedding on condition that they prove to be well-paying customers under the Hydro Cahorra Basa (HCB) scheme of power imports.Zesa spokesperson Fullard Gwasira said: “Under the HCB scheme, which is expected to commence shortly once the negotiations are brought to their logical conclusion, those large power users are ring-fenced with a dedicated line and the revenue that is realised from them is paid directly to HCB in an effort to clear a debt of over US$70 million that is owed to the Mozambican electricity utility by ZETDC.”This arrangement was in place until last year.
Leonard Makombe
