Overview
The Batangas Gold Project in the Philippines is a 1,160-hectare licence with a 25-year Mineral Production Sharing Agreement (‘MPSA’) granted. The Project has a current JORC compliant resource of 440,000 ounces, including a maiden ore reserve of 128,000 ounces (including silver credits) as well as multiple additional targets providing extensive resource upside. Exploration expenditure to the tune of c.$20m has already been invested and a Joint Venture development agreement signed with a local Philippine company with decades of experience in mining, to advance the Project.
Work is focused on completing Exploration and Environmental Work Programmes initially targeting the high-grade Lobo area, where the mineral resources are associated with a linear, steeply dipping, epithermal lode with high grade ‘shoots’ of mineralisation that replicate Medusa Mining’s projects. At Lobo there is excellent exploration potential across the licence with high-grade targets already identified and 14km of identified mineralised structures.
Rationale for Batangas
Batangas is a high-grade exploration project that has a quantified resource that the Company believes is both exploitable and highly extendable. The staged JV agreement is based on the JV partner achieving defined development goals in return for equity in the project and provides Bluebird with a free carry on the development of Batangas. With a change in government and the raising of the importance of mineral development, the JV provides the Company with a partner which understands the governmental, regional and local regulatory situations as well as the operational environment. The model is already yielding success with various milestones especially in permitting already achieved.
The Joint Venture Agreement
A JV with a Philippine company with decades of experience in mining was signed in Q12023 to advance Batangas. Under the terms, an initial 25% of the project was granted to Alpha-Diggers Inc (‘Alpha’), a newly formed special purpose vehicle established to manage the advancement of Batangas to construction. Alpha’s task is to complete exploration and environmental work programmes targeting the high-grade Lobo area of the Project, which includes additional drilling to increase the resource and a redesign of the mine plan for underground mining. On completion of this and the submission of the Declaration of Mining Project Feasibility (‘DMPF’) application, Alpha will receive a further 15% in the project, raising its holding to 40%. The DMPF and ECC are the last major prerequisites for developing a gold mine at Batangas and on approval and granting, Alpha will receive a further 20% of Batangas, raising its holding to 60%.
The agreement provides Bluebird Merchant Ventures with a very strong local presence and a free carry to a production decision.