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Breaker executive chairman Tom Sanders, Western Mining Services’ Dr Jon
Hronsky, company director Lynda Burnett, Paydirt editor Dominic Piper, Resolute
general manager exploration Bruce Mowat, OceanaGold Corp manager, project
generation (Asia Pacific) Peter Caristo and Gold Road executive director, exploration
and growth Justin Osborne gave their thoughts on where the gold mining industry
is heading at the closing panel discussion of NewGenGold Conference 2019

to get that consistency in funding later in
cycles which is very critical. To a large extent,
the funding model is broken and desperately
needs fixing; it is not going to come from the
top, it is going to have to come from us [junior
sector].”
Funding conundrums in the junior sector are
not new and despite the value greenfields
explorers can deliver, raising enough money to
sustain proper exploration programmes is as
nuanced now as it was 20 years ago.
The declining success of genuine Tier 1
greenfields discoveries is one reason for
the dilemma and the overall performance of
industry has left investors scorned.
“There is too much spruiking going on at
the moment, there are too many projects
that haven’t delivered and too many large-
scale projects that have required money, so Osborne said. “The courage the company had to keep
investors have lost confidence in the industry,” Gold Road investing was built on good geology, trust in our own team,
Resources Ltd executive director, exploration and growth building up relationships with our investors so we could raise
Justin Osborne said. money and then at the end of it not being fixated on building
“If we don’t deliver on what we say we are going to deliver; the project ourselves.
that trust you need is not there. Every time you put out an “We could have raised a lot of debt and capital and diluted
ASX release or something in the media, make sure it is true our shareholders, but we had the courage to build the
to your word and you deliver on it.” relationships with our shareholders and the courage to do
There are few currently qualified enough to speak of the a JV,” he said.
travails of taking a greenfields play all the way through to Gruyere Mark II may potentially be in the making now
production than Osborne. that Gold Road can continue to pioneer exploration in the
At the time of print, the tape was being cut on Gold Road’s Yamarna targeting 1 moz gold discoveries on substantial
Gruyere mine just six years after discovery. budgets (2019: $20 million).
Of course, Gold Road has benefitted from having global gold Osborne is confident Tier 1 projects are still lurking in
heavyweight Gold Fields Ltd as a 50/50 JV partner through jurisdictions like Australia, albeit under cover, and believes
the construction phase at Gruyere. there are a number of belts in the country yet to be fully
recognised for their potential.
Nevertheless, Gold Road’s portion of the mine sees it valued
at $1 billion. Meanwhile, Gold Road still retains 100% of “It requires courage from companies and their decision-
makers at board level to start providing exploration funding
5,000sq km of prospective tenure in the Yamarna greenstone
belt which could potentially host a Gruyere replica. to go into these areas. It requires more courage from the
majors to start putting money into these areas also, which
The position Gold Road has established could mean it
we are starting to see from the diversified majors, but we
has the capacity to develop another Gruyere on its own.
aren’t seeing it from the gold majors yet,” Osborne said.
However, the initial mine building experience has been a
sobering experience for Osborne. “I think there is tremendous opportunity in Canada; the
difficult thing is that some of the riskier jurisdictions you are
As well as dedicating boots on ground to developing a 3.9
starting to see pressure come in the financing space and the
moz reserve and 6.6 moz resource at Gruyere, Osborne has
increasing focus on ESG. There are countries out there with
pounded the pavement across the world building belief in
fantastic geological opportunities that probably won’t qualify
the Gold Road story.
under ESG ratings, which is going to make it harder and
Over 2,000 investment meetings in the past six years has
harder to explore.”
resulted in Osborne helping to take Gold Road’s retail/
Outgoing Sipa Resources Ltd managing director Lynda
institutional shareholding from zero to 70%.
Burnett faced a similar scenario during her time at the
“A lot of that is building trust within the investment scene,” company.
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