Integrated Business

Exploration Strategy

The emerald exploration business is a fragmented one, made up of greenfield and undeveloped licences (some with historic production), held predominantly by private families and individuals, and it offers enormous opportunity for consolidation.

The overall area currently and historically in production is relatively small compared to the prospective areas of the two recognised Emerald Belts. We believe that further large finds are very likely and so have focused on building an exploration portfolio.

Substantial new emerald discoveries in the region have tended to be accidental due to the variability of quality emerald formations and lack meaningful exploration work carried out in the area.

There is the potential to use the latest technology: soil sampling, electromagnetic surveys, existing historical data re-interpretation to substantially improve the probability of discovering new emerald mines in the region.

Our strategy will be to select key areas with similar geological character to the major marque mines and carry out geochemical and geophysical exploration to support traditional discovery by prospecting.

Our target exploration area is located in the Muzo-Coscuez Western Emerald belt that includes the mines of Muzo, Penas Blancas, Coscuez, La Pita, Cunas and Las Pavas. This belt holds an unparalleled reputation in the emerald business and is the most productive region within Colombia for emerald production.

“Emerald mining has been taking place in the in the Muzo region, Colombia for hundreds of years, and historians can trace early mining techniques by the Muzo tribe as far back as 500 AD.”