Barrick Gold to Boost Exploration of Gold and Copper Deposits Across South Asia

SEATTLE (Scrap Monster): Barrick Gold Corporation announced plans to explore gold and copper deposits across South Asia. The sector-leading gold and copper producer cited Indonesia as a potential site for further exploration activities.

According to Mark Bristow, CEO, Barrick Gold, the Asia-Pacific exploration team has been in search of valuable deposits along the vast mineral belt stretching from Pakistan to Papua New Guinea. Although the company doesn’t have any confirmed exploration activities in Indonesia, the country is part of its evaluation, he noted. It must be noted that Indonesia possesses abundant resources of nickel, copper and gold.

Incidentally, Barrick owns assets at both ends of the Tethyan Eurasian metallogenic belt- the Porgera gold mine in Papua New Guinea and the Reko Diq copper-gold mine in Pakistan, thus making the belt a point of further strategic investments. Reko Diq, owned 50% by Barrick, is one of the largest undeveloped copper-gold projects in the world, which the company expects to reach first production by 2028.

Moody’s Investors Service had recently upgraded the unsecured ratings of Barrick and all rated subsidiaries to A3 from Baa1, with a stable outlook. The news release by the ratings agency had stated that the excellent liquidity of the company will help it to progress amid gold price volatility.