• SOUTHERN AFRICA | SOUTH AFRICA WHITE RIVERS EXPLORATION Ten year old privately-owned South African gold explorer and developer White Rivers Exploration (WRE) is proving that the Witwatersrand Basin is not yet ready to enter its twilight mining years. The company’s priority project, located in the Basin, which it owns in joint venture with gold major Harmony Gold, is the second largest undeveloped gold resource in the world – and could be developed and brought into production within the next three years, writes LAURA CORNISH. IN SHORT White Rivers Exploration is set to revitalise the Witwatersrand Basin as it targets bringing a major new mine on stream in the next three years. W RE founder and major shareholder Mark Creasy has always clearly believed that the Witwatersrand Basin’s potential to mine significant gold volumes is far from over. It was this motivation and belief which saw the establishment of WRE, whose sole purpose was to acquire mining prospects within the Basin that were dropped back in 2007 when the majors had to convert their old order mining rights to new mining rights and in doing so exit from properties that were sitting idle. Having acquired a significant number of properties in the region, which in many instances abut existing operations and underutilised infrastructure, WRE has spent the last eight years proving up its tenement prospectivity by acquiring old borehole databases from various sources (the Council of Geosciences, mining houses and geologists) and evaluating that data. “We now have the largest privately owned database of the Witswatersrand Basin in South Africa, comprising some 2 500 drill holes of information – largely Tenement plan showing White Rivers Exploration’s assets 24 MINING REVIEW AFRICA | MARCH 2017 located in the Free State where the majority of our tenements lie. Having built up the properties’ prospectivity thanks to our substantial complement of experienced geologists from consulting firm Shango Solutions, WRE has been able to up-value the portfolio, relinquish certain properties and prioritise our focus areas,” outlines WRE executive chairman Neil Warburton, a mining engineer by profession. The hot spot WRE’s data evaluation and interpretation led to what is currently its top priority prospect – 9.56 km2 in size and situated alongside Harmony’s Gold’s Target mine. Known as the WRE-Harmony joint venture project (JV), it is owned 65% by WRE and 35% by Harmony Gold following a binding heads of agreement to work together on the property in May 2014. Following a decision to mine, whereby the JV can utilise Harmony’s nearby Target Mine infrastructure, Harmony becomes manager and 51% owner and WRE 49%. Having spent the last two and a half years collecting additional data on the property, which includes up to 100 km of underground diamond drilling data never before electronically recorded, September 2016 saw the company announce a significant JORC 2012- compliant gold resource