Barrick Gold Corporation

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. This is the event operator. Welcome to BEREC's results presentation for the second quarter of 2023. Following today's presentations, a question and answer session will be conducted. If you have a question and are joining the event by telephone, please press star then 1 on your telephone keypad. We will also be taking questions from those in the room. as a reminder this event is being recorded and a replay will be available on barrack's website later today august 8 2023 i would now like to turn you over to mark bristow president and ceo of barrack please go ahead sir thank you very much and uh

So we're controlling this. Welcome, everyone. Good afternoon for those across the Atlantic, and good morning for those this side of the Atlantic. And a special welcome to all of you who have given up some of the sunny weather outside to join us. Personally, thank you for coming. Appreciate it. I think I felt I should start on a good news story. and that is that, and I'm sure you all know this, certainly those sitting in the hall here, that we saw the average gold price for the last quarter at an all-time high. And it's interesting, a lot of people are suggesting that the gold price is not performing. It's performing extremely well. And for me, the more interesting part is, is that some see this as driven by a forecast decline in interest rates. And certainly having recently travelled right around the world, I really believe it's more about a risk-on situation as we wrestle with... the global economy and deglobalisation of the world as a whole and the fact that China is not, I don't believe, going to get back to where it was. It's certainly going to recover, but not back to where it was. And again, our supply chains and general investment in the economy and... and upliftment of some of those more challenged economies are going to hurt if we don't stop and invest in it. And so, otherwise, all we're going to do is... Create a future where the rich continue to get richer and the poor get even poorer. And so, you know, we held a mining summit in Islamabad last weekend. And it was very interesting for me to see the realization from Pakistan that things needed to change. And there were comments about, you know, it's been... 70 years of mistakes. And this country has everything that it needs to get on top of things. And it's got the people by far, but it needs to care about them. And I'm drawing from the leadership that spoke at the opening of the mining summit. It needs to focus on development and not just development. exploitation and finally it needs to attract foreign investments and in fact the minister of petroleum pointed out that their strategy was turned to turn red tape into a red carpet for investors and that is very interesting that's a massive transition as and as you know that country's got many challenges and and and i i think we've seen west africa what happens when we neglect these developing countries. And we've spoken, you know, many times to some of the major economies in the world about West Africa and the importance of staying there and engaging in conversation and working on investment instead of just lecturing. And again, the elected governments right across that region have failed. And we don't seem to want to do anything about it except lecture. And so there's a big need for the world to re-look at how it manages its business. And again... as far as the policy towards mining and metals in the United States goes, you know, it has to reflect on how important it is just to exploit other people's natural resources rather than develop some of its own and engage in support and build a real mining industry because that's what's required if we're going to have a better world ahead of us and so I think that there and there certainly is conversation starting around those those topics. And as you know, I've spoken a lot about the importance of partnerships and development across the world. And Barak, hopefully I'll share with you today what we've done and now the real results that are starting to materialize in our policy of driving partnerships with our host countries around the world. And I'm also going to spend a little time today on... Focusing in on expiration because, you know, this ongoing debate of you only grow it through M&A. And we've put a lot of effort in the last four years in, one, fixing our assets and, two, building that bench strength in expiration. And we've got some initial pointers now starting to materialise, which we'll share with you in a moment. We're super excited about being able to actually support some of these early results with real borehole results by the end of this current quarter. So that's the sort of outline of my messaging I want to get across today. And I would start first with just a quick look at, before I go further, as usual, presentation is preceded by a course restatement. As you see here on the slide, it's also available on our website should you want to study it in more detail. And then moving on to our KPIs for this past quarter. At the beginning of the year, we guided that our results would be weighted roughly 45-55 in favor of the second half. And certainly, as you can see, the trend is already evident in quarter two. The improvements over quarter one was largely due to the completion of scheduled maintenance on Collins processing facilities, which boosted NGM's performance, as you will see in the number, I'll touch on it just now, and the strong contributions from our Tanzanian mines and Kabali in particular. And of course, you would have seen too, Valadera had a good quarter, better than planned. As always, I will highlight the key aspects of our operations as I take you through the presentation, and this time I aim, as I said, to point to the progress we're making on all fronts as far as exploration goes. So looking ahead, despite some equipment challenges relating to PV ramp-up, we remain on track to... meet our gold and copper production guidance for 2023, and they should drive the costs back down towards guidance. And Nevada is expected to build on last quarter's post-maintenance improvement. PV will continue to ramp up throughput as it expands the plant. We have finished the commissioning, but we're now stuck in the ramp-up. And in Zambia, the Lamona copper mines new fleet is expected to improve mining productivity and throughput. And we land in better grades in the in the main pit in the back half of this year. As far as the financial results go. Increased production helped by the all-time average quarterly gold price, which I just referred to, delivered a 7% increase in operating cash flow and an increase in adjusted net earnings to 19 cents per share. On the back of this, a quarterly dividend was maintained. at 10 cents per share. And it's important that I point out the fact that we are managing this company for the long term. And we are very diligent. We thought carefully about our dividend policy. We are respecting that policy and not disregarding it. We remain the strongest balance sheet in the industry. And as we build dividends, On the back half of this year, we will build up our cash balance again, materially. At the beginning of the year, we launched our new safety drive, as you all know, and we call it Journey to Zero. And we specifically led it across the entire group, and it certainly started to produce revenue. Results, if you look at the lagging indicators, which is not what we're using to manage against, we have the injury frequency rate down 38%, quarter on quarter. But what's key is, for the first time, North America region, the whole North American region, reported an injury free April. And so that's a key step in our commitment to getting our operations back where we expect them to operate as far as safety goes. And LATAM and the Pacific region also recorded zero lost time injuries for the entire quarter. So those are key, more important than the lagging indicator trend. We've methodically tracked our journey to zero and following a full review, we've developed the new fatal risks and associated standards as shown here, along with critical controls of each of the 10 fatal risks. And part of our risk management overview, we also reviewed and updated our field level risk assessment tool that is standard throughout the organization now and really the big drivers to get every one of us particularly the leadership completely embracing this journey to zero Sustainability, as you all know, is central to Barrick's strategies and practices, and it is what secures our crucially important social license to operate. And there were no significant environmental incidents during the quarter and the year to date, and our average water use efficiency for quarter two was 82%, and for the half year, 83%. and again beating our 80% target. Also, our greenhouse gas emissions were down 5% quarter on quarter and 12% against the same period last year. And as you see in this slide, our commitment to biodiversity takes many forms, but was exemplified last quarter by the Barrick-led reintroduction of white rhinos to the Garamba National Park in the northeastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo. And Garamba is a national park we've been supporting since from Rangold days back in 2009. And it's also, it's a personal goal of mine to see this happen, and it comes with another message, and that is, you know, when we arrived in... Kibale, then Motto Gold Mines, back in 2009, the Lord Resistance Army was all over the place. And today, the fact that we can put Rhino back in that park means we've really got on top of the security. So it's a massive sort of... symbol of what mining can bring to these conflict zones. And having just come back from Pakistan, I'm absolutely convinced that if we do the record deck right, we're going to see the same sort of effects, if not better, more tangible in the part of Balochistan where record deck is going to be built. Thank you. Another key point, and I'm not sure all of you are aware of this, but staying with sustainability, also very pleased to announce that we've achieved full conformance with the recently formulated global industry standard on tailings management. And you would have seen an announcement on Friday. with the disclosure of information on our website as per principle 15 of the standard for our very high and extreme consequence facilities. And I'll just point out that Barrick has long been a leader in the responsible management of tailing storage facilities, and we welcome the additional disclosure, which is part of the new standard. Over now to the operations. We start, as usual, with North America, where we continue to build our value foundation in Nevada gold mines, already far more than the sum of the parts that were combined in the merger. And NGM is on the cusp of entering a new growth phase, as I hope to show you in some of the exploration slides. The knowledge gained from a better understanding of the ore bodies is generating new targets and discoveries as well as new concepts designed to deliver life of mine extensions and potentially the next wave of tier one assets in one of the world's most prolific gold districts. These are the Nevada gold mines operating results. with production, as I referred to in the introduction, up 11% quarter on quarter, and it remains on track to deliver on its 2023 production plans. The higher production delivered a meaningful drop in all in sustaining costs, as you can see from the slide, and this is a trend we expect to continue into the second half of the year. Since creating Nevada gold mines, it's worth noting that we've replaced 16.5 million reserve ounces depleted by mining. And as you can see here, we still have a wealth of opportunities with the potential to be big value drivers and are confident that exploration will sustain reserve replacement and deliver an inventory that will secure a 15-year planning horizon and beyond. And I'll come back to that replacement strategy because as we had in Rangold, we're now developing a plan to replace our reserves through the advancement from inventory to resources and then to reserves. And in Nevada, we're starting to see that plan as well. There's no better place to start on this slide. At the top right... This review then at the Carlin trend, which is the gift that keeps on giving. We continue to intersect, and this is quite important. You'll see at the bottom that 23001 intersection that we continue. These are Carlin type grades. and in our quest to expand Carlin and the greater legal complex, and we continue to consolidate the ground around this. And we're talking multi, multi-million ounce opportunities, and we're starting to see that definition, and we're expecting to be able to share some of the holes that we've drilled now, but we're still waiting for the verified assets. But the one thing I've always said to many of you is that when you hit world-class ore bodies, you don't have to send the assays, the logs to the assay lab to work it out. So we're super excited about this potential. At Cortez, the Barrick-owned four-mile discovery is well on its way to Tier 1 status. We shared some of these results with you last quarter. These are big numbers. Every intersection now, we're starting to... to show more opportunity. And the most recent of these discoveries is the Dorothy Breccia, which you see referenced in the slide. But these intersections add significant ounces every time we drill a hole. That's where we are in the ore body today. Strong drilling results staying with the with Cortez Complex from Robertson, which show its potential to grow into a multi-million ounce asset. And it's very important, Robertson. It's still got to be permitted. We are in the process of permitting it. but it's a multimillion-ounce oxide deposit. And that's important for Nevada because we've got capacity in our oxide mills. And you'll remember that Newmont were going to close down their oxide mill even before we did the deal, and we've kept them alive. And this is a very key asset. And we still... to expand this footprint. It's been a very successful exploration project. And finally, at Turquoise Ridge, we've now opened the main, what we call Trug Turquoise Ridge, underground ore body to the northwest and the southeast. And as you see here, and again, significant intersections And this is the least developed of all the world-class ore bodies in the known Nevada operations. And I'll just pause there for a minute and just point out that the... greater level area and certainly the extension, as you see on the slide, that's a completely parallel world-class target that's running parallel to the gold-struck Meikle trend, which is what made Carlin so famous. And we are really at... at a stage of developing a subparallel target along one of the key faults which will parallel that world-class trend that, as I said, has made so many mining companies wealthy. Barrick also, in addition to our Nevada joint venture, continues to expand its North American footprint and drilling is confirming significant discovery potential across the multiple targets in Nevada away from Nevada gold mines. And framework drilling has started on our Pearl String project as well. And and ongoing generative work in ground consolidation is progressing across the Western United States. Again, we've got some developing opportunities, which hopefully we'll be able to share with you during the next quarter. And in Canada... Mapping and sampling at the PIC project near Hemlo has identified some interesting mineralized structures. Our geologists have also started work on the new Sturgeon Lake project, and we've signed an agreement to earn up to 75% on the Patris project, which is just northwest along the same trend as Malartic. So, again, we're in the right place, and we... We're super excited, and we tried, as you know, to look at opportunities to go through M&A, but our geologists are starting to point to some real opportunities to expand our business here in Canada. Moving then on to Latin America and Asia Pacific region, the team is doing a great job, particularly the exploration team. We are busy rationalizing a large historical land portfolio now, particularly along the Andean trend. And we also are moving to secure new opportunities. We've expanded our footprint in Chile. the Dominican Republic, and Peru, where we've made some exciting early-stage progress, particularly in southern Peru at our Austral project. This region also covers Pogra in Papua New Guinea and Rikadek in Pakistan, where there have been some very positive developments during the quarter, which I'll take you through. So starting with PV. Commissioning, as I said in the intro of the expanded plant, was impacted by ongoing equipment failures relating to the flotation and mill circuit pumps, and we are working with FL Schmidt to address these issues and rectify some design flaws. And I'll just explain, we've installed the biggest flotation cells ever. was certainly ever the biggest that FL Smith has supplied. And we've had some issues with some of the shafts and the gearboxes. And we've had to retro-engineer them. And they have also rebuilt some new ones and sent them in. So we are... busy working with them, and until we get that settled, we're running all the circuits, but we're going to take some time to ramp it up to full production. We are still expecting a much stronger second half than the first half, and the expansion project, we are confident, will achieve its full capacity at the end of this quarter, maybe early next quarter. Once completed, the plant expansion and mine life extension have been designed to support an annual production of above 800,000 ounces to way beyond 2040. And this really does make PV a standout Tier 1 mine. And we've got six of those, and we've got a couple in the making. And we are very clear about how we define Tier 1 assets. And just to remind you, when we did the merger, PV... was if we didn't get a solution on the tailings facility, it was going to close in 2021. So we've now got the permits in place, and we're good to go as far as the expansion goes. And when you try and put a value on that, it's like a very big discovery. This is a 22 million ounce prospect. It's big. As I mentioned, Argentina Valadera exceeded its planned production, which is particularly commendable considering the very difficult operating environment Argentina's ongoing currency crisis has created. Strong drilling results from the Morro Escondida target point to its potential as a satellite. To Valadera, we're busy doing that modelling right now, and exploration is also focused on those other targets immediately around Valadera. I think the team is now fully motivated, having achieved some success with Moro in Escondido. And again, you would recall we cut back on Valadera delayed some of the capital into end of next year. This is a very dynamic year. In addition to the currency crisis, it's an election year. It's an election year that's been spread over the whole year. And so we know now who our governor is in San Juan, but we've still got to go through that rock and roll process to get the federal government in place and elect a president. Yeah. So as I noted again earlier, we're rationalising our exploration portfolio in Latin America and prioritising our portfolio. So getting our resource triangle, people who know me know exactly what it means, in order. And we continue to... secure more ground in that area. This is a quick snapshot of where we are looking, and we certainly are excited about the prospects, and we've got a completely new team. It's taken a couple of years now to get that team to start really understanding what we want and where to go, and we're now starting to get those results. And then flipping across to Pakistan, the feasibility study at Rikodik University, made material progress this last quarter and is still scheduled for completion by the end of next year with 2028 targeted for first production of concentrate. Infrastructure development is underway and the refurbishment, which is a key thing of the airstrip, has been approved for flights with a weekly charter now going to site. And in line with our commitment, as you see in this inset, to early benefit sharing with the people of Balochistan. We've already established two primary schools as part of our community investment as proposed by the newly formed community development committees. So this is something that's in partnership with our communities. And by the way, I personally, along with the senior executive, have been to all those communities. And it's worth noting, you know, When you look at the Afghan story and you look at this story and the Baloch people are across, you know, in Afghanistan and in Balochistan of Pakistan, and you see this school and you see that there are more or less 50-50 boys and girls, it's quite an achievement. And I'll tell you a little bit about Balochistan, particularly around Rikkadek. There is no economic activity. And so when you give people a chance to earn money, it's amazing what happens. And it's the only place in the world where I've seen more schools than kids. In fact, all the schools are empty. And so why? Because there's such poverty that the children have to work. to survive. And so us coming there and supporting the children, giving them square meal, getting them to school is the only way they can get educated. And this is part of a program that we did very well in Kabali, and that is educating the future operators of the mine, ahead of the mine. So we've done it, we started with, this is a multi-generational mine, so we've started with junior school. We've also looked at vocational training of those young teens. And then we've gone abroad and looked across the universities for Baloch people who are have already finished or about to finish their degrees, particularly in engineering, but engineering, some economics and processing. And so the first bunch we've now... contracted, and they will be moved to our operations around the world, and they'll start working with us with the intention that they will be the leaders of the operation when we turn it on in a few years' time. So, and again, that's, we commissioned Kabali with local So every day, most of our workers go home into the villages around the mine. And so the community is, are our workers. And that's our intention for Rikardik as well. You would have seen some announcement on Pogra recently. We're at last... nearing the end of the long road towards the mines reopening. And the key one is we've applied for the special mining lease, which is the one that was removed, as you recall, at the end of the last lease period. And for that process to close... we needed to have a number of regulatory procedures. First one is what they call the warden's hiring. That's happened in all the different selected regions. And we've had a security forum led by the key ministers and the prime minister himself. And during that forum, the Minister of Mines formally opened the Development Forum, which is the critical process where everyone has a chance to engage and discuss and share what they want. And it will ultimately culminate in the... It might not culminate in a full... mutual agreement across every aspect because the negotiating tactics in Papua New Guinea has started 120% and see where you land. But it is a serious engagement, and it will... During this process, the government will get to a point where it will finalise its own review of our applications for the SML, and then we'll get that awarded. On the back of that, we've started... The preparation of the mobile fleet, after all this time, we've had to upgrade some of the tankage in the processing facility. We have a new crush on order and we're getting ready to start up. And our expectation is that we should be able to start and pour our first bar of gold this year. And every time I say that, people say, don't you have any more granularity on that? And I say no. But in the fullness of time, we will. And all I can say is that everyone wants the mine started now, so you will see the updates as we get closer to that day. So with that, we move across to Africa and the Middle East. And this, mind you, is by far the most consistent performer in our portfolio. And it's not only a reliable contributor to the bottom line, but also a host to a wealth of gold and copper opportunities. The Lulo-Concato complex delivered its usual strong performance and is on track to achieve its 2023 guidance as it continues to invest in greening its power supply grid as well as replenishing its reserves and looking for more. And again, this has been a spectacular asset. it would be remiss of me not to point out that Mali is not without its challenges. And I would add it has never been without these challenges. We have been operating there for 26 years. And in that time, we built Lulo Godkoto into one of the world's 10 largest gold mining complexes, as well as the country's largest taxpayer and employer. certainly largest employer outside government. We've had a constructive relationship with successive governments through some very turbulent times. And in recent weeks, I've personally engaged with the key members of the current leadership about their proposed new mining code. And I'm very optimistic that, as in the past, we'll find a mutually acceptable way to keep gold shining for Marley. In West Africa, there's a lot of opportunities pointed out. It's a very dynamic place right now, as you would have read in the newspaper with the latest coup in Niger. But staying with LULO, we continue to define wide, high-grade intersections on the extensions along the big structures that host the multiple world-class assets around and within the LULO-Goncato leases. While also across the border in Senegal, we continue to... evaluate the Dilemma joint venture in particular, and we've got the Babanji joint venture, and we are continuing to expand our footprint in eastern Senegal. And in Cote d'Ivoire, we're assessing the Fondandara satellite deposits and other high-priority targets. The team has been extremely successful in adding to the life of mine of Tongan. Moving across to the Democratic Republic of Congo and Kabali. Again, Kabali overcame its first quarter challenges to deliver a substantial improvement, as you can see here, in production for quarter two. And it has its back on – this has really set it back on course to – to achieve its full year of guidance. And we're also really focusing on our underground development to build additional... flexibility, and be able to support the new 10-year mine plan. And ongoing exploration really has highlighted immediately to the west of the KCD main series of deposits the potential for more of the same. And we're quite excited about this recent development. And in Tanzania, which is a real success story, our Twigger joint venture with the Tanzanian government is a poster child for my thesis that mining can be the force that makes undeveloped countries investable. And there's no better example than Tanzania. And it's great to see BHP putting its toe in the water in Tanzania on the nickel project. After Barrick took control of North Mara and Bullion Hulu in 2019, it transformed them into operations capable of producing a combined half a million ounces annually. In other words, a tier one production profile. And we have also shown that we can achieve this goal. and what you can achieve when a mining company and its host country work together to develop its natural resource endowment. And last quarter, conversion drilling at North Mara replaced all the reserves depleted from mining, and we mined the first ore from the Guyana pit. and additional opportunities for resource conversion. Bully's got a very long life, well into the 20s. North Mara's just over 10 years, so big focus there. And it's worth having a look at this slide, and that is we have three Tier 1 terrains in our Central and East African holdings. The Kabali Lease area I've already covered. A new exploration footprint south of Bully and Hulu and high priority permits along the Gakona Corridor, which I've just referred to. And again, this Gakona Corridor is an exciting opportunity. When we were in Rangold Resources, we were always trying to get our... on those extensions. And it's taken us a while to secure the permits because they were lapsed. They lapsed under the Acacia time. And so we've now got them and we're starting to evaluate them. And we're super excited about the opportunity to extend North Morro's life of mine on the back of that. We also have a very... significant intersection beneath the near-beginner pit, as you see here, and it's really got everyone's attention. We're not sure about how it actually fits into the ore bodies at the moment, but it's a recently confirmed intersection. Moving across into Zambia and generally our copper operations, as I pointed out, Namoana is well set to achieve its guidance for the year. It really is going to have a strong second half. And with the implementation of its Onamana strategy, and the rival and commissioning of the new fleet, where we replaced a contractor, which was very expensive. We've already seen a reduction in costs, as you can see here on the slide, and excited about the prospects of Lemoana. Lemoana has the potential, based on our preliminary economic assessment, to be equivalent to our share of the Ricker Dick investment. That's how significant it is. So I'd point out that at the time of the merger, no one believed in Lemoana. It was a high-cost producer making no money. and its subsequent transformation into a potential tier one asset in our copper portfolio is another one of Barrick's big success stories. And we're talking about significant reserve conversion on the back of the feasibility study we're busy with. And the projected expansion on the back of this new super pit, as I pointed out, will add significantly to its production and take the mine life to beyond 2060. And so we're on track to complete that next year. And we've scheduled pre-construction starting in 2025. And our forecast at the moment would bring that expansion from Lemoana ahead of 2020. the Recodec delivery on its first concentrate. We've got some, and we'll be detailing this on the back of the final studies on both projects. In Saudi Arabia, Jabal Saeed maintained its consistent production and kept its cost below the guidance ranges. And early results from our new property, Umar Damar, are exciting. And really, it's a start of something, I believe, that's significant. And what's more, it's been the foundation of us planning growing our relationship with the kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Before I just touch on, and the last one is Chile and Zoliva, which is largely more of the same. Um, I would just point out that really it's Lumana and Kabali that are key for the second half delivery for AME as a whole, but all the AME operations are on track, on target to meet their guidance. And then two more slides. The one that I referred to right in my introduction, and that is If there's one thing more than any other that sets Barrick apart, and I know it's not snazzy and it doesn't require M&A and all that other stuff, it's been our ability to deliver sustained and significant growth in reserves since the merger. And remember, we were all in the same boat before that in 2019. And we've replaced 125% of the gold that we've mined or the gold equivalent that we've mined, including the copper, since the time we started out on our new venture. And again, we will be sharing with the market our strategy of a three-year rolling replacement model because we do have some very big assets. So you'll see the inventory build and then you'll get a big kick in the market. and then you'll get the conversions. And over three years, we're very comfortable, and slowly we will build it into a shorter-term cycle. Of course, it goes without saying that the contributions we're going to make to our copper reserves and resources are significant on the back of the work that we are doing both in Pakistan and also abroad. and also Lemwana and Zambia. We continue our work not only to hunt those world-class gold deposits, but also copper in all the big copper terrains in the world today, apart from Russia. But otherwise, we're very knowledgeable about what's going on in the big copper fields of the world, as we are with the gold. And again, our view is... growth for Barrick going forward is based on asset quality. And I think that's really, when you look at our portfolio today, we've got six tier one, proper tier one assets. We've got a whole pile, five world-class assets. Porger is one of them. It's a 500 plus thousand ounce going to 800, close to a million some years. We share the economics of, on just about a 50-50 basis with P&G Inc. So it's a significant share of value for Barrick. We've got, of course, Valadero, which is no small asset, in partnership with Zinjin. Right now, we're managing the situation politically. We've got Lemuana coming on, and if we can prove it, which we have no doubt we will, is definitely a tier one copper asset. And, of course, Ricodec. once we get through the start and convince everyone this is a real value asset that's right up there with the top five in the world. So, you know, when you look at our portfolio, Tongon is the one that's... the least as far as when you look at it, but it's a very good cash producer because it's built so well that our sustaining capital is so small. And you'll see the costs relative to its total cash costs, it's all in sustaining costs, so not as high as other mines. And it's just about can we find more? And at the end of the day, to close it, it'll cost us around $30 million. So it's not a big... risk in our portfolio. And Zeldavar is a partnership, as you know, with Antofagusta. And then the last asset in our portfolio, so we don't have a long tail. In our portfolio, we sold the tail at every time we did a transaction. And the only one that we have to deal with is Hemla. And we've got some real plans to do that. We're looking at pushing back that pit again with a higher gold price. And we've done a lot of work and PIC, the PIC project is just up the road. That's important for us. So I'm actually there for the weekend with the team looking at strategies as far as HEMLO goes. So another differentiator in this sort of hall of M&A is the fact that we have a clear path to increasing our gold equivalent ounces by 25% towards the end of the year, so 29%. And that is a very significant and a standout point because, as you know, many of our peers have been forced into M&A because they just haven't been able to replace M&A. the answers that they've mined. And I would finish, ladies and gentlemen, with the fact that we certainly celebrate for the first time that on consensus basis the analysts are showing that Barrick has more value than Newmont. The challenge is we're still at a discount to that valuation. So our focus now that we've got our business clear, we've got our teams in good shape, is that we're going to be working really hard to... to get us up there where I certainly come from, and that is a good premium to our underlying value. And we've got some big things to work on. Of course, there's a big delta with Ricker Dick. There's another delta with... With Lamona, there's another big delta with Pogra as we bring that on. And again, there's a big delta in Nevada gold mines. And as we not only within the whole joint venture, but when you add in the prospects of four mile, it's a significant asset for us. And as I'm sure it is, for our partners. So with that, thank you for listening. We'll be happy to take questions. We do have some of our team members online, and we're going to take you out first. And Graham, of course, is here, and a couple of other executives are in the audience here in Canada. So over to you, operator, to manage. Oh, no, we'll take questions here. So we'll manage this process going forward.

Thanks very much for the presentation. It's Jackie Price-Belowski from BMO. Mark, can you talk a little bit about your plans at Zaldivar? I know you've mentioned in the MDNA that it's now classified as non-core. Do you have plans to divest that at some point?

I think, you know, at some point, maybe. Right now, we've just applied with Antofagasta with an extension of the life of mine and the permitting, which we're dealing with at the moment, which shows a much bigger, longer life of mine than we currently have. The reason we say that is that, you know, just in reporting, it's a steady, small operation. It's managed by ANTO. We have an active role in that management as a joint venture partner. As you can imagine, we're not very good at standing back. But, you know, that's the basis on which we've put it in that category. And again, you know better than me, You know, despite the fact that the copper market is in absolute short supply and you just have to go a little way and then there's nothing. There's a softness in the price. So, you know, at the end of the day, you know, we'll manage that strategically better.

Can I ask one follow-up as well?

Sure.

On Porgera, can you talk a little bit about the process from here and what needs to be done before you restart?

So really it's the special mining license, which... which we're waiting for, which will, you know, we've done all the other regulatory work. We've got everything in place. We need that special mining licence, which means that we have all the communities signed off. And once we can do that, and I had a very good conversation with all our key landowners when I was last there two weeks ago. And so there's no doubt everyone wants this mine opened. And it's a very significant deal because never have the landowners had the potential to earn so much from a gold mine or any mine in Papua New Guinea. So I think there's lots of drivers. Of course, there's also the obsession with being able to negotiate the terms, which we've already settled. But that's the good thing about Papua New Guinea, as frustrating as it is, is it's a full consultation before that special mining license is issued. And we know Barrick Plaza and then Barrick had 30 years of no issue. because they got that process right. And we're very mindful that it is a litigious society, and you've got to do this thing to the book to make sure that we can mine for another 30 years.

Mark, you made a couple of comments about the fundamental outlook of the company being very constructive based on the gold price, based on the growth outlook, and then the valuation of the stock where it is. I'm wondering what your thoughts are on using some capital towards the buyback going forward.

Yeah. Josh, you know, that entertains us, Graham and I, almost every day. We have bought back in the past, and we, you know, I think we... Again, we don't want to risk our balance sheet right now. We are very well positioned. We have an extremely strong balance sheet. We are forecasting a growth in cash, and that'll trigger... a net cash position. And as we approach that, you know, the one option, which is the preferred option, is to buy your stock back. Because we absolutely, we are completely in agreement with consensus. And that is, we're trading below what we should be trading and it makes sense to buy. So there's no risk in buying our stock back. It's just how we manage our balance sheet towards that.

Got it. One more question. You made a statement about PORGRA being a world-class Tier 1 asset and with some comments about bringing up analyst expectations. Could you maybe remind us what you think the potential economics of this asset look like, meaning what's the initial capital to get this to Tier 1 status and then what the production and cost structure would be? Thank you.

So it's a low-cost producer because it's relatively high-grade. It's single refractory also, autoclave, mill, crusher mill, simple process, know it well. If you look at consensus, the valuation is... Around $6 to $7 billion on consensus prices. 5% discount, hey, Graham? Yeah. And it's about a billion dollars of capital over the next 10 years. Yes. slightly front end loaded but again we've got a bit of work to do on that a lot of it depends on how we treat the Wangima pit which is not in reserve yet so I'm talking about total resource now 10 years we've got banked and that's important for us because we get to the 50-50 sharing of economics and our intention is that we will we will creates so much value for everyone, no one else will want to, you know, the government and Barrick will be partners forever. You know, that's the intention. So, and there's a big pushback on the western wall of the main pit that we've got to address, and that's what we're busy with at the moment is designing, doing, as I say in the press release, We are designing that pushback at the moment. I think that I can say the underground is in better condition than we expected. So we're happy with that. We've had this constant sloughing of the Western Wall, which has always been a challenge at Pogra. And we need to cut it back and put some remedial work into that wall. The traction is that there's quite a lot of awe on that pushback. And what we hope is that we'll be able to pay for that pushback. And then you've got the Wangima Pit, which really brings a whole lot of additional resources into... the mine plan, and potentially takes it to 20 years, which gives you that big number, if you look at it. And we're using just... That's a broad, rough valuation on using consensus prices. But the key for us is... But in 10 years, we more than get to the 53-47 economic split. And remember, we sweep all our costs that we've incurred to date from the government equity. to equalize. And once we get there, then everyone else benefits. What's important is that the landowners and the province benefit preferentially. So it's carried equity. Just to explain. Graham, you want to add to that?

I think you've done a good job there. I mean, the key point, Josh, really, is that when you look at our economic interest there and you contrast it to the equity interest, the economic interest is almost double the equity interest because of the way that the cash flow split works if you compare it to what you would get in a normal situation if you were paying corporate taxes and a 3% royalty rate. So the combination of that economic splitting of the cash flows combined with what Mark just referred to, which is the sweep of the cash that we've already spent, means that our economic interest is considerably effectively double the value of what the equity interest would imply.

And, Josh, this goes back to the Tanzanian deal that we made and the point that I've been making all along is the problem of the mining industry is they go and invest and promise the world, and then they don't make the money because they don't deliver on the plan, so the government gets nothing because all they rely on is taxes. So what we did in Tanzania is we took the economic interest and split it down the middle. We true it up every year. That's a bit complicated, but we do. So government gets the tax amounts, but if we do not pay tax, they still get 50%. So it's a much fairer way of doing it. And again, Papua New Guinea hasn't... Pogra was a special example and ironically it paid... The foreign currency crisis in Papua New Guinea is directly because we're not expecting importing gold from Pogra because it's the biggest producer and the biggest... the most profitable company in Papua New Guinea. So that's the same thesis, is that the Prime Minister wanted 51%, which I was very happy to give. I mean, after 30 years, he wanted a different deal. He wanted to make sure that he could get all his legal taxes and he wanted to participate in the equity process if we delivered on what we planned. And if we didn't, he wanted still half of the production. So that's what we've agreed to do. And it's a great way of doing business, I believe. And one thing, the only... risk is you have to be absolutely convinced you can deliver on your mind and the models that you shared. And we've done a very similar model in Rikerdijk as well, slightly more skewed that Rikerdijk is a much bigger asset. And also the government are taking a lot of risk themselves through their state-owned enterprises. And we're gearing it with equity with a global funding package.

With debt?

With debt, sure. Sorry, we are gearing it with debt. Sorry, not equity. With a global funding package.

Hey, Mark. Lawson Winder from Bank of America. Thank you for the presentation, and nice to see you today and the team. I wanted to touch on reserve replacement. So you spoke to the importance of reserve replacement to the value of BEREC. What is the outlook for this year, and which assets do you see driving that outlook?

So Africa will replace all of its gold and copper that it's mining. The one that won't will be LATAM, but it's going to bring a whole lot in with Pogra and... and Ricker deck that fits in that region. Um, and we've got this new series of projects in around, uh, Valadera, and we've got some super exciting projects, South Southern Purdue, Peru in particular, and other parts of, of, uh, South America, which we'll share with you in the full in the next quarter or two. Um, Nevada gold mines will add about between 50% and 60% of its current – its this year's production. But then it has a big year next year and the following year. And so that's why what we've said is – there's, on a three-year rolling average, we'll continue to replace ounces. And we'll get Nevada, we're just about there with Nevada, like we have in Africa. And again, Lawson, so much so that, you know, we're engaged in conversation because, you know, in Rangold, we used to, some of our incentives were based on reserve replacement, at least reserve resource replacement. And I believe that's a very good metric in any mining company to remunerate management on. So, you know, that's how significant we believe in the importance of organic growth. Because it makes... Particularly when you look at... Because we've got really big assets... And we've now close to have completed the recapitalization because the Barrick side of our assets were run down and both sides of Nevada gold mine were run down. Barrick side was high graded. The Newmont side was just run down. And we've recapitalized that. We've now got a resource base on the top of that. And so if you add to it, your returns are significant they become infinite because you're adding ounces on a capital base and that's the game you know that's the game about big mining assets is if you've got big ore bodies and you've built the mine properly it produces a long you know the copper miners are good at that that's what makes them so valuable

I wanted to follow up on a comment you made about the value of Barrick's assets, but then the multiple discount in the market. And, I mean, I think you make a case here for why the assets are strong, why the assets should be strong going forward with the reserve growth. What is the market missing or has the market missed over the last two years in your view that's led to that discount?

Well, I would start with the fact that perhaps it starts with the analysts, right? and the management, and that we haven't had that conversation. And so it's pleasing to see that valuation coming through on a blended consensus basis. So that's a good thing. And, you know, we are very mindful, and I said this right in 2019, we had a job to do. And you don't build... great mining companies easily today, particularly not gold companies. They're tough things to build. I've built one myself, and now this is the second. And again, we are mindful that we have to be able to... I mean, I've always been that sort of person. I like to support... I'd like to have an argument, as Josh will affirm, but I'd like to do it on the back of something that's tangible. And I think we really are there today. And the first step is, you know, it's very helpful when the analysts... group are recognizing value and it's even more exciting when they're still headroom, which I've just pointed to. And by far, if you look at our performance, what we say, what we do, how we've managed our balance sheet, what we've promised the market, we've been consistent. like we always are. So I don't think there's any doubt in the minds of anyone. Of course, some people are a little nervous about where we've gone. They were the same when we went into the DRC. But today, when you look at the portfolio of assets around the world, the risks are very similar. Different, but similar, or the same. and what we've shown is big assets work if you pay rent. If they're big enough and they're valuable enough to deliver value to your host country, and I'm sure, Lawson, you've followed... United States mining law and the debate and Rosemont and all that. Our work is hard with the team in the US as I do in Pakistan and West Africa. Gone are the days where you can run mining companies from a 16-floor office block in the developed world. You have to be out there. And again, getting back to how we manage our reserve resource replacement, and that is we move that ownership out to the mines. We've changed the management to be real business people who lead our mines. And they own those assets. They've got quality assets. geoscientists, processing engineers. It's not, we don't remote control our business from a central corporate office. We do hold them accountable and we're always there. I always say to the team, you know, if you go off piste, you start seeing us. If you really get off piste, you see us all the time until we get you back on track. And that's the way we run Barrick. you okay so uh operator can we move uh this

Sorry. So maybe to follow up, sorry, Brian McArthur, Raymond James. I mean, probably one of your hidden values that you're starting to highlight is the super pet. I mean, this thing could be on its own one of the better copper mines out there in the world, plus you have a gold credit. Does it make sense to have all the copper in Barrick going forward, given how big a good a copper company you're going to have? Second thing, you probably can't give me everything on the PFS, but through to 2060, Is that a pretty stable production profile out of the super pit? So, again, it's basically duration forever.

Big low-grade pit. And what happened is the Chimney Pit, it got segregated because people, you know, Barrick was in a position trying to make money. So it dived down and it chased the grade. And, you know, it's a challenge to chase grade in a low-grade blended environment. sedimentary-hosted copper deposit. And what we've done is just go back to geology, and there are a couple of satellite pits that are genuinely higher grade and lower strip ratio. And the exciting thing about Lemoana is that we run the risk of doing the whole pushback for the super pit without going negative cash flow. Because we have these satellite pits that can, so we mine the same strip ratio on a copper waste basis. And so that really – and that's our team. You know, that's what they – but once we got the cost down, so we got the cost down right in the beginning, we understood, got to know those ore bodies and that, and then we looked at the other satellites. Again, a bit like West Africa, they were known in the form of anomalies, but no one ever stuck a hole in them. So that's what we've been doing. And we're far down the road on that process. So we're confident enough that we've got enough copper in those satellite pits that will support. Right now we are mining and we're going to hit some higher grade zones in Lemoana Pit, Chimney Pit now. And at the same time, we've... replaced the contract miner with a new fleet of Komatsu 100-tonne trucks, and we've dropped the cost by $2 a tonne. And that is really changing. And you can see it in the numbers already in this quarter, this last quarter. And so we'll manage that pit to a point where we've got it open on strike. And then that big pushback to create the super pit, we'll use the satellite pits to do that. We are right in the middle of permitting the new tailings facility to It's largely a negotiation with the tribal chiefdom of the region, which we've had a long-standing relationship with. As far as the authorities go, we've got support on that.

So if I look at the slide there, 2029, I mean, you've got Jabal Saeed in there and you've got Zalvidar in there, but you don't have Recodec 2, right? No. So you're going to have like a 25-year thing at that size.

And we are, you know, we're actively hunting in the main copper belts. You know, we're in all the copper belts of the United States. And let me tell you, there's some significant... still within the U.S., as I showed in that slide, broadly. And again, we believe that if you believe in the numbers, which I've always worked on, the US is going to have to change the way it manages mining. And we've taken that bet to get out there ahead of the... And again, we're the biggest miners in the United States already. And we're probably the biggest explorer... Sorry, I stepped out of the box. We're probably... Okay. We're probably the biggest explorer right now in the U.S. as well. Thank you. Anyone else? Okay. Operator, we pass back to you for any questions from the call-ins.

Certainly. We will now begin the... If you are using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing any keys. To withdraw your question, please press star and two. The first question comes from Cleve Rickard with UBS. Please go ahead.

Hey, thanks for taking my question. Good day, everybody. Can you hear me okay?

Yeah, perfectly, Cleve.

Excellent. Thanks, Mark. We had a little bit of technical difficulties on the line, so I apologize if the question is redundant. But, you know, I think in the prepared materials, you called out Cortez, PV, and Turquoise Ridge as, you know, some of the assets where, you know, there was some maintenance, there was some investment done in the first half. And then you expect that increased production run rate into the second half. I asked a similar question last quarter. Do you expect that second half run rate to continue into 2024? Have you done the bulk of the kind of bigger work that you need to do with those mines in order to sustain production at that second half run rate?

Yeah, absolutely. And look, let me just take one at a time. So the Cortez maintenance is really development and it's not really actual maintenance. like processing maintenance turquoise ridge was a premature hot spot on one of the autoclaves and we brought it forward it was going to be in quarter three normal plan maintenance again we brought it forward we changed a lot we used the opportunity to change a whole lot of gear pumps and tidy it up we've got quite a bit of work to do to get turquoise ridge to where we want it to be um The roaster maintenance was a big maintenance, scheduled maintenance on the Goldstrike roaster. More importantly, it was the shutdown on the Gold Quarry roaster, and also we used that shutdown to tie in on the expansion project. So we got one more shutdown to do next year, I think it's second quarter scheduled. And we'll finish the expansion of the... Gold quarry roaster. So not only do we maintain the run rate, we lift our throughput capacity in the gold quarry roaster by between 15% and 20%. And so we bring down the costs, and so we add production capacity. Because right now, Nevada gold mines is constrained on double refractory oil processing capacity. You know, we've spent a lot of time on planned maintenance to the point that a lot of the planned maintenance was planned because it was neglected. And so we are getting back to a proper planned maintenance, which is scheduled maintenance, which is a normal course of business, which is baked into our facilities. forecasts anyway. But to answer your question, in simple words, yes, you'll see the throughput maintained at a higher rate, largely because we add more capacity next year.

Right, right. That's very clear. And then one just quick follow-up. You know, the gold rush record of decision is something that, you know, continues to come up in sort of our conversations. And, you know, I see that you're expecting it now, I think in Q4. But there was also a little bit of discussion around some modifications to the BLM. I'm wondering if if that record of decision is restricting development there at all, or if these small modifications are allowing sort of, you know, timely development to continue.

So on the development side, we're continuing. It does start impeding production because we need to get... ventilation up ahead of where we are and so if it carries on much further it'll impact production we've guided that we are looking at the specific impacts at this stage you know this is all about Rosemont and Department of Interior and we've been engaged with them all the time and again this issue about permitting unmineralized claims. And the fact of the matter, two things. Gold Rush doesn't need a tailings dam. It doesn't. It's mineralized everywhere underneath and where we are working. It's got a very small footprint because we're using already permitted infrastructure. So it doesn't doesn't fit, and even if you wanted to, you can't put it into a sort of Rosemont argument. And it's taken a little while for us to get BLM, the state and particularly the federal part of it, to clear it. So they have cleared it now. So that's why we are pointing to a specific time period. But, you know, it's a little bit like Pogra. You know, we are talking all the time and we're working towards it. We have got permission to extend the development under the expiration permit in... So, you know, we can run into next year and still get the flexibility in place. But we need, soon we start having to put the raised bores up to get the ventilation cleared to be able to ramp up the... or production. So that's really where we are. And every indication is now that it's been cleared to finalise the EIS, the first step, and then that goes to, once that's finalised, the record of decision follows shortly. So that's why we've got, and we make these forecasts in conversation with our local BLM team.

All right, very good. Thank you, and take care.

The next question comes from Alan Spence with BNP Paribas Accane. Please go ahead.

Yeah, morning, guys, and thanks for the opportunity. I've got two, and I'll just take them one at a time. The first one on Turquoise Ridge, there's some unplanned maintenance events in the underground. Can you just expand on what that was and if that's carried into the third quarter?

Yeah, so we had a fall of ground in part of the development in Turquoise Ridge, which we, again, it's part of our design and changing the design, which we had to step back and deal with. We had a further shutdown on the shaft, on some of the safety elements, in the shaft that we needed to fix, and we did that. The main impact was really the autoclave hotspot, which we had to take the autoclave down and fix it. We were scheduled to do that, as I said, in quarter three. We brought it forward. So on balance across the year, it doesn't impact on our production. That's really the most important of the unplanned maintenance. It was planned, but not then.

Okay, understood. And then one probably for Graham. Could you talk a little bit about cost expectations into the second half, how you've seen the development of labor consumables?

Can you hear us?

You're back, yeah.

So you wanted to know about inflation and our outlook on that.

Yeah, into the second half, please.

So I'll answer. Graham's got a technical challenge here. So we certainly see costs flattening off, some sort of softening a little bit. We're forecasting a sticky sort of inflation. We're around where it is today. We have some... higher costs which are still Ukraine-related, ammonium and cyanide and things like that. The big driver is, in the second half, is increased production will bring down our costs, as I pointed out in our guidance. And we do believe that the costs will come down, but not all the way down in the short term. And that's the way we're managing. But as I will tell you from years of experience, hit your numbers on the production, costs always look better. We're certainly not facing inflationary costs right now. We've got a couple, but we've got some plans. Like, we're much more able to manage the cost and logistics and AME. The US has got restrictions on imports and other tariffs and so on. So, you know, we manage that differently, but... I think, I don't know, Graeme, now that you've got the mark, you can... I think you've got it covered there, Mark.

I mean, in terms of the inputs, we're comfortable with the assumptions that we were using for 2023. There's some swings and roundabouts, but generally we're in line. So the costs are expected to come down in the second half as the production ramps up. And, yeah, that's how we get down there. The other point, just to reiterate, is that our cost guidance is obviously based on a gold price assumption. In 2023, we were using $1,650. And we've also guided that for every $100 change in the gold price, that has about a $5 impact on our cost per ounce. So based on where we are at the moment, that's about $15 of additional costs compared to the base case assumption. So I think that's important to take into consideration as well.

All right. Thanks, guys. The audio managed to come back at the end. I missed most of that, but I'll read the transcript for your full description. Thanks.

Okay. Sorry about that.

The next question comes from Yijie Wu with Haitong International Securities. Please go ahead.

Hi, Mark. I'm Lisa from Hightower International Security. And I have two small questions. The first one is about the Pogra project. How well did the tax issues taken by Barrick or jointly with Xinjin Mining?

So jointly with Xinjin Mining. So we split it 60-40. So there was some... It was a negotiated settlement, so it was quite a tough thing to sort of assign. But, you know, we worked very closely with St John, and Chairman Chen and myself sat down and worked through and allocated some to the Barrick past, because the settlement included all the way to the new Porgra... So we didn't leave any residual tax assessments behind. We cleared the whole thing. And so there was some tax that was future-based, some tax that was specific to the assessment which was done just before they closed the mine, and then some related to the past before Zinjin was established. part of the project. So we worked through that and basically settled as per the announcements on a 60-40 base. So we shared the tax.

Got it. Thank you. And my second question is, I noticed that our future focus will be on copper. And currently, many copper mining companies have encountered many problems, such as declining grade and water shortage. Will we encounter the problem of increasing copper costs in the future? Thank you.

So, you know, the one thing, that's a very important point you make, and that is a lot of the copper produced today is from old mines, which started out as new mines decades ago, like 50 years ago. And so that is a challenge. And of course, if you're talking Chile, water has become a big issue in Chile and the copper mining. On the assets that we've got... We are in a better league because of grades generally. Ricadec comes with gold, which makes it more attractive and blends the risk a bit. And on the water aspect on Ricadec, that's one of the critical aspects. deliverables on our feasibility study and we're very focused on that. As I said, we're going to be doing the first real in-depth water study for that whole part of Pakistan stroke Balochistan but the work that we've already done, we're comfortable that certainly for the first 10 years we can draw water without impacting those aquifers. And there's a lot more that we've sort of certainly can point to at this stage, but it needs a lot of work. Ultimately, there are further options. I mean, as that... that whole Tithian metalliferous belt gets developed, this is going to be a region where infrastructure and particularly desalination is going to have to be part of the bigger developments going forward.

I got it. Thank you. Have a nice day, Mark, and welcome to China.

Thank you very much.

The next question comes from Anita Soni with CIBC World Markets. Please go ahead.

Hi, good afternoon, Mark, and thanks for taking my question. I just have one left, and I think it's about PV. And my apologies for the background noise here. But I had the opportunity to visit the assets three months ago, and it's definitely an impressive asset. But you were just talking about some issues that you were having with some of the SL Schmidt pieces of equipment. Can you talk about how you see that evolving in Q3? I know you said you would be ramped up in Q4, but can you tell us how it's going this quarter and what we should be expecting in terms of throughput for this quarter?

So, Anita, you would imagine everyone's in PV. John Steele, all our engineers from other parts of the world, you know, who are commissioning experts, our engineers, FL Schmidt subject matter experts. This is a new piece of equipment and we've had challenges with the shafts and the gearboxes. We have replaced them already. We are re-engineering some of the design issues out as we speak and manufacturing some additional pieces of equipment so we've got backup. So we're working on it. I mean, for me, I don't have a feel right now because these sort of start-ups, they can happen in a Flash. Well, you can work them out, you know, over a couple of weeks. But we are waiting for a final plan, actual schedule, of how we're going to get them back to... So we're able to engineer and replace parts and engineer little pieces and that'll get them running. But, you know, we need to get this thing to full capacity. And... You know, it would be remiss of me to not point out that this is a big asset that's going to run for 20-plus years. You know, we are dealing with it. Certainly when I sit with the team, and I've just come from there, we're still going to have a substantially better second half than first half at PV. And, you know, that's... And as of today, we are still planning to be within guidance. Okay.

All right. Thank you. That's it for my questions.

Thank you, Anita.

The next question comes from Tanya Yakuskanik with Scotiabank. Please go ahead.

Yes, good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for taking my questions. And I apologize if this has already been said, but there was a lot of technical issues on the call today. Just wanted to circle back to PORGRA, if I could. Just want to confirm that, Mark, what you said was that we're just waiting for the special mining license that's on the critical path for us to start up. And I just wanted to confirm that you said that local communities have all signed off. Are those two comments correct?

So we are waiting for the special mining lease, which is the same thing, effectively. That's what it's termed. And the landowners agreement, as you know, we disclosed that earlier. way back when there was this conflict between us and government, the landowners were aligned with us in reinforcing the importance of poor ground, getting it back online. So the equity split is... 10% to landowners, of which 2.5% go to what we call the LMP landowners and 7.5% to the SML landowners, the main owners of the land on which the mine operates. And 5% goes to the Enga province. And that's the split. Of course, the conversation in the development forum was, around that and also other contracts that are, you know, that are always in place. People like the people living down the river, people on other concessions like businesses dolomite concessions and other various concessions that we work with and all of that is part of that and of course the government is also committed to investing back into Pogra and the Pogra Valley like schooling and we've been talking about some tax offsets even because there's a real realisation how significant Pogra is to the economy of Papua New Guinea so the answer is yes and no because this is a process of course there's always a fallback because we have agreements but this is a process of consultation which is prescribed by the law the first one is the warden's hiring and that is really defined for the government through the warden in the MRA to mineral resource authority or the mining department to sit and listen to all interested and affected parties and how their, their issues, proposals, whatever, and record them. And, uh, and that is a, uh, an obligation. And then following that, the development forum, which is more of an proper engagement, and it doesn't have to be completed, uh, But once the process is far enough advanced, the government will make the decision at a point in time on issuing the SML.

Okay. And when we get this SML? Can we still assume a six-month ramp-up? Is that still the case for this mine, to get to full capacity?

Yeah. I think that once we move onto the site, six months is a good target, yeah. We'll, of course, produce gold before that, but getting it ramped up, that's a good assumption.

And should I still be envisioning this mine to produce on a 100% basis about 500,000 ounces, total cash costs of 900 and all in sustaining costs of 1,200. Is that still a reasonable number?

That's a fair guess at this stage. We'll update it as we go.

I think, Tanya, once we're up and running, we'll share some updated numbers with you.

Once we get the start-up plan, which is what we're working on, we will guide you. But, you know, we've got those guidance out and they will stick until we change them. And the ramp-up is... You know, it goes ahead of that. So you working on 500 as a first crack is reasonable on a 100% basis. Of course, it goes a lot higher than that within a couple of years. Okay.

All right. I'll wait for that new mine plan, which would that be coming, you know, once we get this up, would it be reasonable to assume hopefully...

like, you know, with your guidance and... Yeah, we'll give it to you when we announce that we're actually properly starting up the mine. I've got Graeme here trying to sort of dodge the bullet.

I think, Tanya, I think all things going according to plan in February when we do our normal annual guidance is probably the best guess.

Yeah, OK. No, thanks for that, Graeme. And just on the reserve replacement, because again of technical issues, I just wanted to understand as a company overall, did I correctly understand that this year we would likely see more increases to resources and not necessarily reserves? Was that a fair statement?

That is correct, yes.

And that reserve replacement you can see occurring in Africa on both gold and copper. and not in LATAM, was that also?

That's correct. But you'll see that rolling up next year.

Okay. All right. So that's helpful. And then just lastly, just on the overall resources for the company, would that have been an increase in gold and copper for both?

Yes, it's mined copper and gold. You're talking about the second to last slide?

Yes. Okay, that's perfect. Thank you so much.

Perfect. Thank you.

Our final question comes from Martin Pradier with Veritas Investment Research. Please go ahead.

Thank you. I have two questions. The first one, in Lumswana, can you maintain... Are you talking about much higher grade in second half compared to Q2? Can you give us some idea of what you mean in terms of higher grade in second half?

Look, higher grade in Lumswana is low grade anywhere else. So it's not a lot, but it's more consistent and slightly higher grade.

I mean, I can actually... Compared to Q2, are we talking 10% or 15% higher in the second half?

Sort of 10%. There's a good number.

Okay, that's fair. And in Kivali, you had a good recovery... can you maintain or improve production in second half compared to Q2?

We've got a good second half for Kabali. It's good overall. You know, the second half... Yeah, it's really consistent with quarter two.

So that's the kind of run rate that we expect for the rest of the year.

OK, fair enough. That's it. Thank you very much.

There are no more questions from the conference call.

Thank you very much. Thanks, ladies and gentlemen, those of you who are here. I think we would like to invite you for a snack and a glass of wine, we thought. We'd break the tradition here. New Barrick, so join us. Thank you, everyone.

This concludes today's event. Should you have additional questions...

And have a pleasant day.