The Koné deposit is considered to be an orogenic lode gold-style system, hosted by brittle ductile shearing within a quartz diorite/mafic volcaniclastic package in a Birimian Greenstone sequence of the West Africa Craton.

Koné is a mesothermal, structurally controlled gold deposit hosted within a north-south trending, westerly dipping (50?), composite package of sheeted 20-30m thick diorite intrusions which have been emplaced by multiple intrusive pulses. These diorite intrusions are of the same composition and genetically associated but display a variety of textures. The package as a whole is up to 350m in true thickness and can currently be traced along strike for 2.4km

The Koné Gold deposit is hosted by the composite diorite body and is characterised by very large mineralised true widths, averaging >200m over the southern half of the deposit, with a maximum of up to 330m (MDD015B, 330.7m grading 0.58g/t) i.e. almost the entire width of the composite diorite body.

Higher grades (1-1.5 g/t) are associated with high density “swarms” of 2-5mm thick, foliation parallel, translucent white to smoky quartz veinlets containing fine grained sulphide. Lower grades are related to dissminated fine grained pyrite. Importantly, no significant silicification of the host rocks is associated with the mineralisation resulting in positive comminution characteristics.

Mineralisation at Koné is interpreted to be controlled by a major thrust shear at t ........

Based on the geometry of the deposit and the proximity to surface, the deposit will be mined via an open pit mining using a conventional truck and shovel mining fleet.

Pit optimizations were run using processing cost and recovery data. Mining costs were broken into base and incremental mining costs. Costs were based on West African mining contractor bids. The operating strategy assumes that mining operations will be carried out by a contractor on a cost per tonne basis, utilising a mining fleet comprised of 145t rigid body haul trucks with suitably sized loading units.

The Koné deposit will be exploited through a two pits, a smaller northern pit which reaches a depth of 130m and a larger southern pit which extends to a depth of 470 metres deep. The overall strip ratio for the pits is 0.93:1. Based on the assumed mining equipment, a bench height of 5 meters in the oxide, 10 metres in the transition and 15m in the fresh rock was designed, although geotechnical conditions allowed for up to two benches to be excavated between safety berms, within the fresh rock. There may be some opportunity to mine to higher bench heights in areas of bulk waste.

A ramp up period of 12 months was assumed at the start of the schedule the total optimised production tonnage is 35 million tonnes per year. The target for Year 1 was 9.9mt and 11.0 mt of high grade crusher feed respectively, with all subsequent years targeting 11.0 mtpa inclusive of the lower grade stoc ........

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