Canada’s Aton Resources (TSX-V: AAN) has been granted a three-year extension to its current exploration licence for the Abu Marawat gold asset, located in the central eastern desert of Egypt.
The Vancouver-based miner became in February the second foreign company allowed to mine gold and other metals in the Arabic country, which last year issued new regulations to ease foreign investment in the sector.
The country’s mineral wealth
remains largely under-explored and undeveloped, unlike its deposits of natural
gas. The lack of activity was due, in part, to Egypt’s past system of royalties
and profit-sharing agreements. They made it difficult and unprofitable for miner
to explore for and exploit minerals.
The fresh rules eliminated the need for miners to form joint ventures with the Egyptian government and limits state royalties to a maximum 20%.
Multiple targets
The announced permit extension
allows Aton to continue exploration work on the concession while awaiting final
amendments to Egypt’s new mining laws.
Aton has identified a number of
gold and base metal exploration targets in the Abu Marawat gold-copper deposit,
such as Rodruin, Abu Gaharish and Hamama West.
The 600-sq.-km Abu Marawat
concession has an inferred resource of 2.9 million tonnes grading 1.75
grams gold per tonne, 29.3 grams silver per tonne, 0.77% copper and 1.15% zinc.
Egypt, which links northeast Africa with the Middle
East, has targeted $700 million in new investments in the mining and energy
sectors by 2030.