Poor funding has mainly constrained the venture, mooted a few years ago.

Mwana Africa group chief executive Mr Kalaa Mpinga said: “The cost of bringing Hunters Road to 10 000 tonnes of nickel per year as part of a three-phase project is estimated at around US$170 million.”

Mwana Africa intends to produce 2 500 tonnes of nickel concentrates per year in the initial phase at a cost of US$67 million.

Feasibility studies carried out in 2007 found that the project has 243 000 tonnes of metal in measured and indicated resources.

The company decided to embark on the project in order to augment ore supplies to its Bindura Nickel Smelter and Refinery complex.

Hunters Road deposits lie within the Gweru-Midlands South Greenstone belt.

Nickel deposits within the project, seen as being of superior grade, will provide BNC with additional feeding stock for its refineries.

The nickel deposits were discovered by means of a soil geochemical anomaly and were initially explored through trenches and a feasibility study was completed in 2008.

Mr Mpinga recently said current conditions were supportive of a restart of BNC’s operations.

BNC presently mines nickel at the Trojan and Shangani mines, but reserves there are said to be declining.
Meanwhile, Mwana Africa is looking at ways to finance the restart of BNC and it was recently reported that the group is at the verge of clinching a deal to finance its operations.

The deal has been linked to a London Stock Exchange-listed company with interests in mining.

The mining group also sealed a deal with the Industrial Development Corporation of South Africa to finance operations at its subsidiary company, Freda Rebecca.

IDC South Africa approved the provision of up to US$10 million debt funding for the Freda Rebecca gold mine.

The recapitalisation of Hunters Road and the revival of the Zimbabwe Iron and Steel Company is expected to create jobs in the Midlands Province and Redclif town is also expected to expand.

The two companies are partners in the Tethyan Copper Co (TCC) joint venture, which has a 75% interest in the Reko Diq project in the southwestern province of Baluchistan and hold the exploration license for the site. The provincial government holds the remaining 25%.

The cancellation of the license — apparently meant to ease anger in Pakistan’s poorest province over outsider exploitation of its natural resources — would further damage Pakistan’s image as a destination for foreign investment and would throw a wrench into the plans of the mining companies.

“The cabinet has said they wanted to cancel the exploration license but it has not been finalised,” Mushtaq Ahmed, secretary for the provincial mining ministry, told Reuters.

He said there was a chance the deal would not be canceled, and that the situation should be clarified in coming days.

The deposit holds more than 11 billion pounds of copper and 9 million ounces of gold.

A Tethyan official said the company had not been officially informed of any decision by the provincial government to cancel the deal, although that was the company’s interpretation of developments.

Shares of both Barrick and Antofagasta, which had planned to have a feasibility study done on Reko Diq by mid-2010, were down slightly.

“TCC is looking into the current situation and seeking clarification to satisfactorily resolve (it),” said Vince Borg, spokesman for Barrick, which is the world’s top gold producer.

Barrick stock was down 2.6%, or C$1.10, at C$41.90 on the Toronto Stock Exchange, while London-listed Antofagasta fell 1.9 percent to 1003 pence.

LOW-LEVEL INSURGENCY

Separatist guerrillas in Baluchistan have been fighting a low-level insurgency for decades for control of the province’s gas and mineral resources, which they say are unfairly exploited by the country’s richer and more powerful provinces.

The provincial government recently said the cancellation of the Reko Diq agreement would be a “step towards getting control of the provincial resources in accordance with the wishes of the people.”

Many investors are hesitant to invest in Pakistan because of security worries as the country battles a Taliban insurgency in the northwest. There has been a wave of suicide attacks over the past couple of years, some targeting foreigners.

Net foreign investment in Pakistan fell 25.6 percent to $1.08 billion in the first five months of the 2009-10 (July-June) fiscal year from $1.45 billion in the same period a year earlier, the central bank said last month.

Zijin has already agreed to buy a 19,99% stake in Indophil from Swiss-based miner Xstrata.

Indophil owns a 34,23% stake in the $5,2-billion Tampakan copper and gold project in southern Philippines, controlled by Xstrata.

The Tampakan project has an Australasian joint ore reserves committee (JORC) compliant mineral resource estimate of 2,4-billion tons containing 13,5-million tons of copper and 15,8-million ounces of gold at a 0,3% copper cut-off grade.

The project is in the final feasibility study phase, which is due for completion in the second quarter of 2010. First production is scheduled for early in 2016.

Zijin is offering A$1,28 a share. The offer period for Indophil shares would start on January 18 and would close on March 19.

“Yesterday BHP reported that it would only divest 25 percent of its stake in the projects. Thus, there is nothing special in this case actually,” Director general for coal, minerals, and geothermal Bambang Setiawan told reporters Thursday.

Bambang said several companies were already interested in acquiring the shares and that BHP would make a decision on this no later than the end of March this year.

“We want them to make the decision faster, because they have no reason to prolong the process as with the 75 percent stake, they will remain the operator of the project,” he said.

The Maruwai coal project consists of seven Coal Contracts of Works (CCoW), locally known as PKP2B, with a total working area of 330,000 hectares. The initially proposed main development was the Haju open cut mine, one of the seven, on which BHP planned to invest about US$100 million in investment. The company had originally planned that the mine should begin coal production by the middle of 2009.

However, in June last year BHP announced that it had stopped the development of the Haju mine, stating that this was not sufficiently in line with the company’s long term investment strategy. The company also announced that it decided to stop a feasibility study of the Lampunut Block, another mine in the Maruwai project and also put its activity in the other five areas on hold subject to further study and a final decision.

“We are reviewing *with a view to* canceling all projects in Indonesia,” Indra had said earlier. “These projects do not fit with the company’s long-term strategy,” Indra Diannanjaya, the Maruwai project’s external relations manager had said on June 9, 2009.

But this earlier threat to drop the proposed Maruwai coal investment, along with the danger of a total disinvestment from Indonesia by BHP Billiton has now been reversed and BHP now remains interested in a huge nickel project, which could also have been dropped.

Earlier in November 2008, BHP had decided to drop its plan to develop a $4.5 billion nickel mining and refining project in the Buli area of North Maluku. Initially, BHP planned to develop the area with Indonesia’s second-largest nickel producer PT Aneka Tambang (Antam).

But, Bambang said that he was now optimistic that BHP would remain operating in Indonesia and not implement the earlier threatened disinvestment.

“They said that they were even ready to build a railway for the coal transportation in Maruwai if no other private investor was interested in doing this,” he said.

Bambang, however, quickly added that the company was still waiting for a recommendation in favor of the proposed nickel project from the governor of Central Kalimantan. The process would take some more time as the governor was still waiting for the completion of the province’s spatial planning framework.

Most of the loan, about $2-billion, will fund the development of the Boschekul copper project in northern Kazakhstan, which could produce 12,5-million tons of copper ore annually.

The FTSE 100-listed miner said on Wednesday it would use $100 million to develop the Bozymchak gold/copper project. The remaining $600-million – available for signing over the next three years – would be allocated to other projects.

“Bozymchak will now move into development, with first output in 2011, and the feasibility study for our major copper growth project at Boschekul will start in early 2010,” said Chief Executive Oleg Novachuk.

“Securing this funding is a major boost for copper production from Kazakhstan and will help to meet the growing demand of our customers in China.”

China is the world’s top consumer of copper, a metal used widely in construction and power.

Shares in Kazakhmys were up 0,2% at 1313 pence at 1144 GMT, valuing Kazakhstan’s largest copper producer at about 7-billion pounds ($11,2-billion).

Kazakhmys said in October it was in talks with China Development Bank and Samruk regarding a major unsecured loan facility.

The Company has the advanced zinc-lead-silver-gold Paguanta Project in northern Chile.  An initial drilling program in 2006 confirmed a significant mineralised zone. Following a second drilling campaign in mid-2007, Herencia announced an Inferred Mineral Resource of 2.5Mt at 4.1%Zn, 1.3%Pb and 77g/t Ag (2% Zn cut-off). In 2008 the Company undertook an additional 10,000m of drilling and followed up with a Scoping Study which was completed in December 2008.

Herencia aims to progress Paguanta toward development in the near term.  A diamond drill program is scheduled to commence in early 2010 and subject to the results from that drilling it is planned to move the project into a Feasibility Study phase in 2H2010

Michael Bohm, MD of Herencia Resources, talks about developing a low risk zinc-silver-lead-gold project, a JORC compliant resource that outcrops at surface and is open along strike and down dip, a potential gold-copper story at depth, and obtaining mining title over all project tenements at Paguanta in Chile.

Chief Consolidated Mining plans to resume mining at a zinc, lead and silver deposit at Eureka in the US state of Utah after initial drilling of core samples is completed.

Chief Consolidated chairman and CEO Gordon Blankstein said the company is drilling for copper, silver and gold at the extension of the old Kennecott Bergin Mine and the Trixie Mine to ensure that the site contains deposits, according to deseretnews.com.

“The Bergin is extremely rich,” Blankstein said.

The company’s 16,000-acre plant covers part of Eureka as well as an area to the south and west of the town in the Tintic Mining District of Utah.

Mining work in the district will start after Chief Consolidate completes an update of the 2001 feasibility study.

Taking in the Merlin deposit and another project in the same region there was now a collective minerals resource of almost 140 Mt.

The company said heap leach studies for an SX-EW operation were nearing completion.

Chief executive, Peter Reeve, said the deeper sulphide polymetallic resource at Mt Dore remains open and that the established resource contains both secondary and primary mineralisation.

The secondary mineralisation, which is amenable to heap leaching, was now 53 Mt grading 0.65% Cu.

“We will now work hard to establish the parameters for a second development project on the Mount Dore system with a copper heap leach, SX-EW project following our success with the preliminary definition of the Merlin molybdenum and rhenium project,” Reeve said.

The estimate of Mount Dore’s total contained metal in both the copper and polymetallic targets was 610,000 tonnes of contained copper (1,340 M lb); 240,000t zinc, 360,000 oz gold and 21 M oz silver.

Of this the Mt Dore heap leach project would have a total contained metal inventory of about 340,000t of copper.

In 2008 Ivanhoe Australia started a series of studies into the potential to recover copper from the copper oxides and transitional sulphides by open pit mining and conventional heap leach, SX/EW methods.

With the focus on the Merlin project these studies were deferred pending completion of the column leach testwork.

Reeve said the quality of the engineering studies for the proposed leach pad designs, crushing and stacking systems, electrowinning and solvent extraction plants are of a high standard and are not expected to require significant modification between the scoping study and feasibility study design.

The supply of acid for the project is a critical item with two options being investigated — a sulphur burning acid plant on site, and transportation of liquid sulphuric acid to site.

The Mt Dore mineralisation now stretches for over 2.5 kilometres along strike and continues north over the top of the Merlin mineralisation and down dip to the east.

Ivanhoe Australia, which is 83% owned by Ivanhoe Mines, said that at another north west Queensland project – Swan-Mount Elliott work was continuing on upgrading the Swan high grade zone.

The initial mineral resource at an 0.25% Cu cut-off, was 475 Mt @ 0.5% Cu and 0.3 g/t gold – an in ground resource of 3 Mt of cupper and 5 M oz gold. This takes in a near-surface oxide resource of 16 Mt @ 0.6% Cu and 0.35 g/t gold.

Meanwhile, the scoping studies on Merlin were expected to be completed by early 2010.

At the close of trading on the ASX today Ivanhoe was static at $A3.99

Joe Kircher, Vice President and COO of Nevada Copper commented, “Initiation of the Pre-Feasibility Study at Pumpkin Hollow marks a major milestone for the Project as we move towards a commercial production decision. We are pleased to be teaming up with Snowden’s proven expertise to define a preferred development option for this world class copper resource.”

Drilling Program:

Nevada Copper began mobilizing drill rigs the first week of November and currently has four (4) drills rigs including three core rigs operating around the clock at Pumpkin Hollow. The drilling program is designed to convert 80% of the 2009 Inferred resource within the mineable boundaries into a Measured and Indicated category for Pre-Feasibility mine planning and reserve calculation. As reported in July, 2009 the Mineral resource at Pumpkin Hollow at a 0.2% copper cutoff stood at 9.3 billion pounds, consisting of:

PUMPKIN HOLLOW RESOURCES

Drilling will include in-fill and step-out holes designed to both upgrade the current resource classifications and to test for further resource expansion down dip and along strike in areas where the deposits remain open. Initial drilling will focus on the high grade eastern deposits.
This drilling program is budgeted at approximately Cdn.$6 million and consists of approximately 25,000 meters to be drilled during the next 4-6 months. Tetra Tech MM Inc., an industry leading international engineering firm, has been retained to prepare an updated resource estimate following completion of the drill program. Results from the drilling will be released as they become available.

Pre-Feasibility: Snowden has assembled a world-class team of major mining industry consultants, with extensive industry experience to assist Nevada Copper with developing the Pre-Feasibility Study. Their team and respective specialties include:

Snowden: Project Management, Geology, Open pit and Underground Mine Optimization, Metallurgy, Geotechnical and Financials

Scare-Davey: Processing and Infrastructure

Knight Piesold: Environmental, Tailings, Permitting and Socio-Economic

Nevada Copper’s previous National Instrument 43-101 compliant economic studies at Pumpkin Hollow have identified two optimal development scenarios. First, a large integrated open pit and underground mining complex feeding a single 60,000 tpd concentrator producing up to 125,000 tons of copper per year over a 24 year mine life. Secondly, and highlighting the Project’s high grade nature, a development profile was designed exploiting ore, averaging 1.9% copper per ton, and envisions a 7,500 tons per day operation, primarily underground, producing approximately 40,000 tons of copper per year over a 14 year mine life. The latter scenario preserves the integrity of the larger scale integrated open pit-underground operation but requires only 25% of the capital. Both options demonstrate extremely robust financial results.

Initial Pre-Feasibility efforts will focus on a trade-off study evaluating a range of mine plans consisting of various combinations of open pit and underground operations with different ore and waste production rates, access configurations, material handling strategies, mining methods and cut-off strategies. Financial and technical metrics derived from the trade-off study will then be assessed with the preferred development profile(s) selected for completion of the detailed Pre-Feasibility design. Completion of the Pre-Feasibility is scheduled for the 2nd quarter of 2010, with commencement of the Definitive Feasibility Study immediately thereafter.

About Nevada Copper

Nevada Copper has 45.1 million shares outstanding and is well funded with Cdn.$12 million in cash.

Nevada Copper is an emerging copper company, responsibly developing its advanced stage Pumpkin Hollow copper-gold-silver-iron property into Nevada’s next copper mine. Concurrent with a resource delineation drilling program, metallurgical, geotechnical, hydrological, and environmental baseline data are being collected and processed for inclusion in the Pre-Feasibility Study.

To date over 530 drill holes containing in excess of 223,000 meters of drilling have been incorporated into the resource database. In July 2009, Nevada Copper updated its National Instrument 43-101 compliant resource estimate. At a 0.2% copper cutoff grade, the measured and indicated copper resource is 5.6 billion pounds of copper, contained in 488 million tons grading 0.58% copper and 983 thousand ounces of gold and 34 million ounces of silver. An inferred copper resource of 3.7 billion pounds of copper is contained in 441 million tons grading 0.42% copper and 468 thousand ounces of gold and 21 million ounces of silver. Additionally, there is also an open-pit measured and indicated resource of 78 million tons of iron and inferred resource of 51 million tons of iron at a 20% cutoff.

Within these large resources is a significant high grade copper resource in the East deposits. Using a 0.75% copper cutoff grade, the measured and indicated resources contain 1.4 billion pounds of copper in 49 million tons of material grading 1.47% copper and, in addition, the inferred resource contains 496 million pounds of copper within 20 million tons grading 1.22% copper.

Additionally, there are open pit resources on the property in the West deposits. At a 0.20% cutoff the West deposits contain a Measured and Indicated resource of 306 million tons at 0.51% copper and an Inferred resource of 230 million at 0.42% copper for a total of 5 billion pounds of contained copper.

The Pumpkin Hollow project is under the supervision of Gregory French, CPG #10708, a Qualified Person as defined in Canadian National Instrument 43-101, who is responsible for the preparation of the technical information in this news release.

That timetable — which envisions an early start to development and commercial production by 2013 — would seem a bit more accelerated than what Ivanhoe predicted in October, when company officials eyed output by late 2013.

Rio Tinto (RIO.L) (RIO.AX) is a minority stakeholder and funding partner in the project.

“Ivanhoe is clearly undertaking an aggressive development program on the Oyu Tolgoi project,” BMO Capital Markets analyst John Hayes said in a research note.

Ivanhoe, Rio and Mongolia wrapped up a long-awaited investment agreement on Oyu Tolgoi in October, giving the Mongolian government a 34-percent stake in the project.

Oyu Tolgoi is seen as one of the world’s largest untapped copper and gold deposits, and lies in the Gobi Desert, about 80 km (50 miles) from the border with copper-hungry China.

The initial open-pit phase of the project is expected to cost $3.5 billion, while the partners will concurrently spend $1 billion to begin to develop an underground component to the mine.

TO BUILD AIRPORT

In a statement, Ivanhoe said the 2010 budget provides for an early start on a site-wide development program, pending the successful completion of remaining conditions required to put the investment agreement in effect.

Those conditions include review of a feasibility study, which Ivanhoe expects to be concluded in coming weeks.

“This is basically to kick-start the project from the point of view of infrastructure,” Ivanhoe Chief Executive John Macken said at a mining conference on Monday.

Work in 2010 is expected to include construction of a 97-metre (320 foot) concrete headframe and a regional airport capable of accommodating Boeing 737-sized aircraft.

The company, which has a cash position of about $1 billion, has said the mine should produce an average of more than 1 billion pounds of copper and 500,000 ounces of gold annually over the first 10 years of its 30-plus years of life.

Ivanhoe recently received $388 million from Rio Tinto, completing the second phase a private placement financing deal.

Under the financing agreement between the two companies, Rio has the right to buy 43.1 percent of Ivanhoe’s common shares over the next two years. It may increase this stake to 46.6 percent through purchases on the open market.

Rio currently owns a 19.7 percent stake in Ivanhoe.

Shares of Ivanhoe were up 42 Canadian cents at C$12.97 on the Toronto Stock Exchange on Monday afternoon.