This was announced after a working visit to the Colomine gold mining site by the acting Minister of Mines, Prof. Fuh Calistus Gentry.

According to experts, the gold processing system currently in use in Cameroon, particularly at the Colomine site in the Ngoura sub-division of the East Region, is an open system that results in low gold metal recovery and wastage of resources. These points were made on December 12 during a working visit by Acting Mining Minister Prof Fuh Calistus Gentry. He used the occasion to announce the introduction of a new method of processing gold ore.

The new method will increase the recovery rate from 30 per cent to 90 per cent. This new closed system will turn tailings, which were previously dumped into the environment, into potential deposits that can be mined to extract more gold. “We want to convert the current system to a cyanide leach system, which means the extraction of gold grains by exposing the crushed mineral to a low-cyanide solution,” explained the deputy minister.

He also indicated that a mission will be going to Brazil in the coming days to study everything necessary to move the project to phase two next year for optimised production. The new method will use the chemicals instead of releasing them into the environment.