According to the company, progress has been made toward reaching design capacity of the mine. Mining is going well with 3.2 million mt of ore placed on the leach pad. Leaching is progressing efficiently with flow of pregnant solution to the process plant at 85% of design capacity. Gold recovery to carbon is over 50% (approximately 150 oz/d) and improving. The CSH mine, said Jinshan, is in line to become the fourth largest gold producer in China.

“This is the company’s first mine, and a very significant undertaking in a remote part of China. We are very pleased to have successfully opened this mine and to see this kind of progress in such a short time with no major problems identified,” said Cal McKee, Jinshan’s COO. “We are confident that we will achieve full commercial production in the next few months, and we are already looking at ways to increase the production.”

The company also noted that with mine production progressing, it is now focusing on advancing other projects over the next several months. It has two drill programs under way and is conducting brown-field exploration work along a 9-km potential extension to the known mineralized zone at the CSH mine. At the property’s Southwest zone, drilling has focused on extending the strike length of the known resource and upgrading some of the Inferred resources to the Measured and Indicated categories. At the Northeast zone, a drill program is under way beneath the currently planned pit. Drill holes have tested the zone approximately 100 to 150 m below previous drilling with the goal of defining additional resources below the current reserves. Updated resource estimates for the Southwest and Northeast zones are expected to be completed at the beginning of 2008.