Russia to auction three diamond placer licenses
MOSCOW. Oct 19 (Interfax) - The Russian Federal Subsurface Resources Agency (Rosnedra) will offer licenses to three diamond placers in Yakutia in Q4 2010.
A government instruction says the agency will offer licenses to the Ebelyakh, Gusiny and Dalnaya sections.
The Ebelyakh placer contained B reserves of 2.425 million carats, C1 - 13.663 million carats and C2 - 464,200 carats for dredge mining as of January 1, 2009. The property also contains B - 1.464 million carats, C1 - 6.294 million carats and C2 - 816,600 carats for open-pit mining, plus off-balance C1+C2 reserves of 1.646 billion carats for dredging and 1.259 million carats for open-pit mining.
The Gusiny property contains B reserves of 1.139 million carats, C1 - 2.267 million carats and C2 - 1,800 carats.
Dalnaya contains B1 - 651,000 carats, C1 - 7.811 million carats and C2 - 2.25 million carats.
Russia mined 34.759 million carats of diamonds in 2009 - 5.9% less than in 2008. Alrosa , Russia's diamond monopoly, mined all but 3% of them. Alrosa mined most of its diamonds in Yakutia.