Location | |
---|---|
Location | Nzega District |
Region | Tabora |
Country | Tanzania |
Coordinates | 04°21′S033°18′E / 4.350°S 33.300°E Coordinates: 04°21′S033°18′E / 4.350°S 33.300°E |
Production | |
Production | 148,675 |
Financial year | 2009-10 |
History | |
Opened | 1999 |
Owner | |
Company | Resolute Mining Limited |
Website | Resolute website |
The Golden Pride Gold Mine is an open pit gold mine located in Nzega District of the Tabora Region of Tanzania. It is operated by Australian mining company Resolute Mining Limited. [1]
Open-pit, open-cast or open cut mining is a surface mining technique of extracting rock or minerals from the earth by their removal from an open pit or borrow.
Gold mining is the resource extraction of gold by mining.
Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the earth, usually from an ore body, lode, vein, seam, reef or placer deposit. These deposits form a mineralized package that is of economic interest to the miner.
Golden Pride was the first modern commercial gold mining project developed in Tanzania since the country's formation in 1964. [2] [3] From its opening to 2010, the mine has produced 1.68 million ounces of gold. [4]
The mine also lents its name to the Golden Pride Children's Choir, which hails from local villages around the mine and has toured internationally. [5]
The mine was closed in late 2013. In its 15 years of operation, the mine produced more than 2.2 million ounces of gold. [6]
Gold mining in Tanzania in modern times dates back to the German colonial period, beginning with gold discoveries near Lake Victoria in 1894. The first gold mine in what was then Tanganyika, the Sekenke Mine, began operation in 1909, and gold mining in Tanzania experienced a boom between 1930 and World War II. By 1967, gold production in the country had dropped to insignificance but was revived in the mid-1970s, when the gold price rose once more. In the late 1990s, foreign mining companies started investing in the exploration and development of gold deposits in Tanzania, leading to the opening of a number of new mines. [7]
Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central and Western Europe, lying between the Baltic and North Seas to the north, and the Alps to the south. It borders Denmark to the north, Poland and the Czech Republic to the east, Austria and Switzerland to the south, France to the southwest, and Luxembourg, Belgium and the Netherlands to the west.
Lake Victoria is one of the African Great Lakes. The lake was named after Queen Victoria by the explorer John Hanning Speke, the first Briton to document it. Speke accomplished this in 1858, while on an expedition with Richard Francis Burton to locate the source of the Nile River.
Tanganyika was a sovereign state, comprising the mainland part of present-day Tanzania, that existed from 1961 until 1964. It first gained independence from the United Kingdom on 9 December 1961 as a state headed by Queen Elizabeth II before becoming a republic within the Commonwealth of Nations exactly a year later. After signing the Articles of Union on 22 April 1964 and passing an Act of Union on 25 April, Tanganyika officially joined with the People's Republic of Zanzibar and Pemba to form the United Republic of Tanganyika and Zanzibar on Union Day, 26 April 1964. The new state changed its name to the United Republic of Tanzania within a year.
The history of the Golden Pride project goes back to 1989 when Samax Resources was granted a prospecting license. In 1994, Samax entered a joint venture with BHP to develop the mine, but, in 1996, BHP decided not to progress with the project. Resolute then took over from BHP and subsequently acquired Samax's interests, too. In September 1997, Resolute completed a feasibility study for the project. [2]
Construction of the mine was completed in November 1998, for a cost of US$48 million. The mine was opened on 7 February 1999 by the President of Tanzania, Benjamin Mkapa, with an initial mine life of seven years but this was later extended. [2]
The mine was upgraded in 2002 from a through put of 1.6 million tonnes to 2.6 million, at a cost of US$10.6 million. [2]
The mine was the scene of a robbery in April 2009, when 3,500 ounces of gold were stolen by armed robbers. [8]
Production figures of the recent past were:
Year | Production | Grade | Cost per ounce |
2007-08 | 150,224 ounces | US$ 449 | |
2008-09 | 127,047 ounces | US$ 488 | |
2009-10 [9] | 148,675 ounces | US$ 520 |
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