(Ecofin Agency) - The Tongon gold mine, of which Randgold owns 89%, has finished paying its USD 448 million shareholders’ loans and is now in a position to pay dividends Mark Bristow (photo), Executive Director of the London- and New York-listed company, said. This was on 24 October, during a press conference on the quarterly activities of the Tongon mine where the loans were used in part to finance the need in investment capital of USD 570 million.

This is according to Mr. Bristow, an important achievement particularly when considering the global gold industry environment characterised by decreases and shortages in funds for mining. “Tongon has already earned the Ivorian state approximately USD 90 million in terms of royalties and taxes”, Mark Bristow revealed.

Côte d’Ivoire “will from now on benefit even more from this mine with the dividends that the government will receive due to its free shareholding of 10% in the company but also from the increase in revenue when Tongon starts paying the corporate tax in full at the end of the year”, he added.

The mining activities currently undertaken around Tongon have increased the reserves, despite a decrease of 18% since 2009, and extended by an “additional year” the shelf-life of the mine where the workforce is made up of 97% Ivorians, we learned

“We keep on looking for deposits of several million ounces in other regions of this very promising country and we are on the verge of launching our biggest exploration campaign in Côte d’Ivoire”, Mark Bristow announced.

The Tongon project is located in the Nielle permit, approximately 55 km from the Côte d’Ivoire-Mali border. For 2015, Randgold Resources is looking to produce about 260,000 ounces of gold for a local direct cost of USD 820 per ounce.