New gold finds not keeping up with resource depletion

The latest analysis of gold exploration by well respected Halifax, Canada based minerals focused research organisation, Metals Economics Group, suggests that despite a huge focus by global miners and explorers on precious metals exploration over the past few years, the rate of new gold resource discovery is substantially lagging behind resource depletion. The Group's latest study, Strategies for Gold Reserves Replacement: The Costs of Finding and Acquiring Gold, reports that significant gold finds (of at least 2 million ounces) over the past 14 years could only replace around 56% of the estimated amount of gold mined over the same period - and this is only if these same discoveries prove to be economically mineable! Indeed the report suggests that location, politics, capital and operating costs, and market conditions, will inevitably further reduce the amount of resources that will reach production.
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