RE: Article on MinesiteSorry the link was not the best, here is the article from
www.minesite.com
NEWS
Offshore Diamond Hopeful, Afri-Can Minerals, To List On Ofex.
Montreal listed Afri-Can Marine Minerals is on its way to the Ofex
market in London , and will list this autumn with help from David
Williamson Associates. The company is a marine diamond
exploration and development company operating mainly off the
coast of Namibia, where it is one of the largest concession
holders with interests in 28 exploration licenses, covering
26,500 square kilometres.
Namibia is the world's fifth largest diamond producer by value
with an average per carat of US$257. This figure may be a bit out
of date following the hefty setback currently affecting prices of
rough stones, but the important facts are that most of the
diamonds produced in Namibia are of gem quality and around
70% of total production would have come from offshore mining
last year if Namco had lived up to expectations. Five years ago
the marine diamond industry attracted little attention, but it is now
believed that its potential has barely begun to be exploited with
experts estimating the overall inventory of Namibian marine
diamonds at over 2 billion carats
Afri-Can Minerals has just raised C$1.8 million by a private
placement from European, Canadian and African investors and
this money will be used mainly for the geological sampling
programmes of the Woduna concession (Block J) and the
Together Quando concession (Block B). The aim is to prove the
presence of diamonds on the concessions and to begin the
calculation of resources. Both these blocks are in shallow water
and represent Afri-Can's near-term production potential. They
are next to a region where Marine & Coastal Geo-Consultants
has estimated inferred diamond resources exceeding 4.25
million carats and it is this firm which is currently interpreting the
geophysical survey carried on both of them.
Water depths in the Woduna concession vary from 78 to 167
metres and about 15 per cent of the sea bed area contains a thin
covering of sediment and exposed bedrock outcrops which are
very prospective for diamonds. The total marine concession
covers 995 sq kms and Afri-Can has agreed an option and joint
venture agreement with Woduna Mining to acquire up to a 70%
undivided interest. It also has an option to earn a controlling
position in three adjacent concessions totalling 2,905 sq kms in
area, as well as in a smaller, shallow water concession to the
east, and will be operator of these joint ventures.
Afri-Can's large southern marine diamond concession block is
in deeper water and adjacent to De Beers' rich concession
areas with inferred marine diamond resources estimated at 8
million carats. Afri-Can has an option and joint venture
agreement with Namibian Gemstones on the block which totals
22,500 sq kms. This gives it a 60 per cent interest and Afri-Can
has an option to acquire another 20 per cent. An initial
geophysical survey covering 41% of the concession identified
large areas of eroded bedrock and abundant features typical of
areas where diamonds are concentrated elsewhere in the
Namibian marine zone. Encouraged by this the company will
carry out a grab sampling programme followed by a detailed
geophysical survey on several priority areas in order to estimate
the size of the potential resource.
1 Aug 2001