It is my pleasure to share an extended interview with Mr. Michael Bennett, President, CEO, and Director of Altamira Gold (TSX.V:ALTA). You can find the recording at the link below and a raw transcript to follow.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0BwzguBvmPvuYQmgyWmtscXpwZTQ
This interview was recorded on September 18th, 2017. Things are happening quickly for the company and I look forward to bringing you more on this special situation. Find out more on the company's website, which is full of great info: http://altamiragold.com/
Peter Bell: Hello. This is Peter Bell and I'm here with Mr. Michael Bennett from Altamira Gold. Hello Michael, how are you?
Michael Bennett: Hello there Peter, I'm fine thank you. How are you?
Peter Bell: Great. Monday morning, 8:45 a.m. Pacific. I gather you're down in São Paulo, Brazil?
Michael Bennett: Yes, I am. I'm traveling to London tonight, so out of my normal hometown here.
Peter Bell: Wonderful. In the recent news release, announced that you are now President and CEO of Altamira. Congratulations.
Michael Bennett: Thank you very much Peter. There has been a lot putting this company together and still will be in the future, but we believe we're getting onto the right road here now with some great projects. Alan, even though he's stepped out of the president's role is in the chairman's role now. We have a long history together, so I think it'll make a great duo in this company.
Peter Bell: Wonderful. I was so grateful to have a chance to interview Alan in the last week of July there during the Sprott's Symposium in Vancouver. I published an article too, 7,500 words with Dr. Alan Carter, Altamira Gold A-L-T-A is your ticker. One of the four letter ticker symbols on the Venture. I was really blown away to get the story from Alan at the time. Difficult for me to summarize it maybe, but I feel that nonetheless it's a simple story at this point.
Michael Bennett: The story, really, is a story of following up old garimpeiro workings from the late '70s, '80s and taking a window of opportunity in Brazil, which wasn't really available in those times because there were too many artisanal miners on the properties, and making sure that we picked up the best property packages in the early 2000s in order to be able to get this position now, which is going to be unique in the future. Do enough work on the properties to change several of them now into mining properties and also take the other ones down the road in the exploration phase.
Peter Bell: Amazing to hear that ownership of some of these goes back to the early 2000s, that was a detail despite all the information I picked up from Alan, that was one thing that didn't quite stick with me or maybe I didn't hear or ask him about. I do recall having asked him about the fact these projects were vetted in some sense in private companies and that distinction and the precedent that exists with the royalty on Brazil's largest gold deposit, which Alan owns in a private company – very sophisticated dealings in both the public and private markets.
I think sometimes people over emphasize, the public and really lose sight of some of the important things that happen in the background or prior to things becoming public, whether it's, artisanal miners in Brazil or the prospectors in British Columbia, there's a part of the mining exploration industry that's not public.
Michael Bennett: I think that's a very important point, Peter. Obviously if you don't have good ground you don't get a running chance of getting a mine in the first place. I would say that if you look at our projects, take the Cajueiro project as an example, there are probably very few projects in Brazil right now, which have gone from the exploration stage, we've got three main plain blocks there, which have all had their final report now approved by the mining offices. We're going through the stages work, which will take us through the environmental license. Now, that's a very important loop to jump through in Brazil and gives us a title for many, many more years to come. Gives us the opportunity to take this to a mining project which many areas don't have.
I think the other thing to take into account is the expertise in Brazil because it's important to understand how the system works here and to make sure that everything is in order because the mining system and the environment system are very much dependent on dates. You have to comply with certain things at certain times if you don't do that you lose your properties. I think we've done a great job here, we shored up a big land position in the Alta Floresta Belt and one other project in Para in the Tapajós. For a small company like ourselves, we feel that we've really beaten a lot of others to the mark.
Peter Bell: It would seem to be the case! And that’s just the start of the race. Since I've first encountered you, things have moved significantly. I find the company's promotion on social media and stuff, to be amongst the best in class. Everything that I heard about from Alan about the backstory of the group involved is quite impressive. Cajueiro as a discovery, is there anything that you could help orient me in terms of timing there?
Michael Bennett: Cajueiro is quite a big property, it's 40,000 hectares, more or less, and so there are several areas over a strike length of about seven kilometers which need to be further investigated. We've picked up two of those areas this year, with the first 1,000 meters of drilling that we've done this year we've re-investigated two of those areas, and the results of trenches have been put out and drill will be put out as soon as we get them.
The same thing occurs in other properties we have to the west of Cajueiro. We have a big land property called, Apiacás, which covers a huge area, 40,000 hectares has now been granted by the Brazilian Government. Probably about the same amount of ground is still pending. We feel that we've picked up a very important position right at on the southern edge of the Cachimbo Graben, which is a structurally important area and probably has less through movement, which shows a lot of the gold in both of those properties.
Peter Bell: Any sense of how big that area with the Graben is?
Michael Bennett: It's a broad geological unit. We probably have something like 70 kilometers of strike length in total over those two projects. If you look at the entire belt, it's several hundred kilometers long, but I would say that we've picked up, going back to the position of the garimpeiro, and where gold was concentrated and alluvial gold was taken out in '70s and '80s, we've picked up the lion's share of the important part of that belt, the known part of that belt.
Peter Bell: Does that include the Mato Grosso in line with the Juruena project with Crusader Resources off to the west there?
Michael Bennett: It's on the same sort of trend. We are around about in the Apiacás project probably 60 or 70 kilometers away from the Juruena, the Crusader project.
Peter Bell: Is that the direction and the orientation of the strike is kind of westerly there?
Michael Bennett: There are two important strike directions. The east-west movement is probably caused by subsidence in the Cachimbo Graben, and the north-east south-west direction are brittle fractures, which have been caused by movement along these east-west structures. These tension fractures open the rock to allow the hydrothermal fluids to come in, which then place the gold and other metals into these placement rocks.
Peter Bell: That's the Graben we were discussing to the north there of Apiacás?
Michael Bennett: The Cachimbo Graben divides the two provinces, so it divides the Alta Floresta belt from the Tapajós belt in Para.
Peter Bell: Is the alteration concentrated into a zone here? I wonder about the genetic model and all that.
Michael Bennett: There's a lot of chloritic alteration associated with both the Cajueiro and the Apiacás projects. This chloritic alteration makes the host rock a lot softer so where you have got wider zones of mineralization you can see that in terms of the erosion and it forms topographic dips.
Part of the work that we've done is to try and follow up what I call the early geo-chemistry. The local garimpeiros went in, but they usually went in and worked in the drainages because it was easier for them to just do sluicing when you hit the water. When it went up onto the higher ground they didn't have enough water, so they actually ended up leaving a lot of the saprolite and primary mineralization behind there.
The structures that they followed very often sit below the drainages that they worked. We are getting our teeth into a lot of these areas now and we've drilled quite few of them, as I say, but we've still got three of four very important areas in Cajueiro project, which haven't been taken any further than the soil sampling stage.
We've got ground geophysics and airborne geophysics over most of the property area. That geophysics will be used both for defining trenching and drilling on our new target areas. It'll also be used for other work, Peter. Geophysics has come a long way in the last 10 years and we'll be using that air mag to do deeper modeling to try to find the source or the roots of the system, which haven't really been understood in the past. In other words, to try and figure out where all this gold and base metals is coming from.
Peter Bell: Wonderful. Some questions about just the overburden and the dips that you mentioned there. To start with maybe just the overburden. Does the jungle coverage limit your choices in terms of geophysics at all?
Michael Bennett: The area itself was all jungle covered, but a lot of that's been stripped away now by cattle farmers over the last 30 years. Even then, if you walked through one of these grassy fields you probably wouldn't see more than 20% outcrop, if you're very, very lucky. What the area has had is a lot of saprolite cover, and the saprolite depends on where you are topographically in the area.
If you're on a topographically higher area, the saprolite may only be 3-5 meters deep before you get into weathered bedrock. If you're into these areas that I've just talked about where you've got the streams or a topographic dip, then the saprolite is generally a lot deeper and can go down to 40 meters before you get into any bedrock.
Those are things which make exploration a little bit more challenging. Where soil sampling over different areas can be difficult to correlate between one area and another, so we've had to use a mixture of soil sampling, auger drilling, and trenching to understand better our targets before we go in and drill them.
Peter Bell: Exciting! 40 meters of saprolite? Yes, please.
Can I can ask a bit more about these dips that you mentioned? They make me think of some placer deposits that I've heard about in B.C. where there seems to be a very soft rock underneath the river or creek bed that is pretty heavily concentrated with gold in parts. The thinking is that that soft rock is the source of the gold in the river in some cases, there's coarse gold, there's fine gold, there's aged, gold's been coming out of there for a long time, continues to do so. At an accelerated rate now that the placer miners are in there. Interesting comparison between private market, illegal placer miners in B.C. and some of the artisanal miners in Brazil, an interesting comparison in passing.
And a geological question – it would seem to me that with these softer veins could potentially give you a line of weakness that would be eroded more quickly and give a source for the placer gold. Am I in the ballpark with some of that?
Michael Bennett: Yes, you are Peter. The source is twofold. If we go back to structural interpretation, there are really three structural directions, which are prevalent in the area, one's east-west, which we've talked about, which is parallel to the Cachimbo Graben. The other one is northeast-southwest, which is the tensional breakage due to the east-west movement. There's a northwest-southeast direction, which usually is a nonmineralized event, but displaces some of the other structures.
What you can see when you look at the maps and when you look at where the old boys have worked is that they've worked along many of these streams and where the streams are northeast-southwest they are sitting on top of mineralized structures, so they've taken alluvial and some of the colluvial mineralization in that stream.
Where the east-west structures cut across these almost north-south drainages, they have also obviously enhanced that alluvial and colluvial gold mineralization in there. The guys have worked deeper in these areas because where you've got a coalescence of structure, you've got more of the rock broken up and hence you've got more saprolite and so we can go down deeper. All these factors have helped them to work and they've also hindered in some areas because when they got onto the higher ground, these boys in the '80s, '90s were just not equipped to take gold out of areas where there was no water.
Peter Bell: Thank you. And this what about this trial mining permit at Cajueiro?
Michael Bennett: The actual concept in Brazil of the trial mining permit is the extension of the exploration permit. It's quite an interesting concept. Exploration projects need to do metallurgy to understand how simple it is to free up the gold from the bedrock. In that case, you need to take larger samples, so the trial mining permit is designed as an extension of the exploration permit and it allows you to produce, to understand the metallurgy, and to understand the grain size, and the association of the gold. It allows you to take this into a mining phase before you actually decide to apply for the final mining license.
Peter Bell: Okay. Interesting to consider that is the natural extension of the permitting especially when I see on slide 7 here that you've completed first phase drilling on four projects. If you help me with the names here? Cajueiro, Colider, Carlinda, Nova Canaa.
Michael Bennett: Yes, that's correct Peter. We're presently drilling on our Crepori project in Para. It's very early days there, but it's pretty important for us because permitting has been a bit of a problem in the past. It's been slow in Brazil, but we've been very persistent and managed to get all our mining permits, exploration permits, and environment permits in place.
In our business, you must get the timing correct. In Para, the garimpeiros persisted a little bit longer – until the 1980s and '90s. Five years ago was the first time I actually visited one of these properties in Para and it was still quite difficult to get there at the time. Now, having just made a visit with Alan about a week ago, the garimpeiros have got a completely different view to our company now.
They realize that if they can continue to take anything out it can only be in the oxides. Once they get down to the sulphides they're really not going to be able to take out the gold. Since they're all now landowners there, it's been an easier road than it would have been five years ago. We're very happy with the way things are going. We believe that the company will really open up new frontiers in that respect.
Peter Bell: Amazing. To that point, I'm looking at slide 50 with Crepori project area and I see Cuiú Cuiú, Tocantinzinho, TNZ, Coringa nearby. Those three projects have different owners at this point, but intimately related to this company and the management team behind Altamira here.
Michael Bennett: The last one you mentioned, Coringa, was one I started off for a company called, Chapleau Resources back in 2006-2007. I set Chapleau Resources up in Brazil. In those days it was pretty difficult to get in there, but we managed. We put a great team together, which is important in everything we do. I like to have a small, efficient team who understands how things work in whatever country they're working in, like Brazil in our case. That's the only way you can be effective and faster than most in going in.
Peter Bell: And time is money. Really important to be quick and not let those opportunities pass by because the economic cycles continue.
Michael Bennett: Absolutely, Peter. You know our game is all about timing. We all want to make mines. That's something I've always done through my career and if we're going to do that, then we have to have everything in place. That goes right through from the permits to the geological prowess of the project, to drilling it out as efficiently and rapidly as possible, and taking it into a pre-production or production stage when the metal price is correct as well.
Peter Bell: Great, thank you. I'll just mention in passing that I believe Altamira is a very new public company, so all the issues that come up with the corporate side of things I think are very clear with company. Would you say that's fair Mike?
Michael Bennett: Alan has done a great job taking the company, changing its name, changing its directors, and taking it down a new road. That's enabled us to fast-track these exploration projects. The Juruena belt has been the little brother of the Tapajós for many, many years, but I think we will rapidly see now that the Juruena belt is going to become a very, very important geological terrain, not just in Brazil but in the world.
Peter Bell: This is this question of major sources of gold globally, it's a pretty tight market of people who are looking to establish ownership and bring those things into production. Sorry, just to clarify, did you say the region around Cajueiro?
Michael Bennett: We have the north of Mato Grosso, so in the state of Mato Grosso, we have eight projects. The two largest of those projects are on the southern side of the Cachimbo Graben, so there's Cajueiro, which is our focus project and where we've done the most work. Then a project which we have acquired more recently called Apiacás, out to the west of that. We haven't done a huge amount of work on that and we haven't really put out a great deal of information, but I can assure you that the geology is very similar to Cajueiro and the shareholders will be in the near future seeing some important developments in that area.
Peter Bell: All of these project that you're describing running right along a pretty significant waterway there, feeding into the Amazon. Again, the first phase drilling completed on four of these. Cajueiro would you say is significantly more advanced than the others though at this point?
Michael Bennett: Cajueiro is a bigger area, Peter, so it requires more drilling. We have identified more soil anomalies there. The other areas of Nova Canaa and Colider are smaller areas. We've done a couple of thousand meters of drilling in each of those areas in the past and identified high grade gold and polymetallic zones there, which require some further works.
The Nova Canaa is still an exploration project. The Colider project has been taken into the final phase and has had the exploration license approved and it's going down through into the mining stage now. Carlinda is a project we haven't really done a huge amount of work on. A few holes have been drilled into it and it's still in the exploration stage and needs to be investigated further.
For a small company we've got a lot of projects. We've got a lot of varied projects. If we wanted to, we could look at projects which are just gold but we have other projects that are gold-copper or lead-zinc. We are now opening up from the Mato Grosso side, which was our focus previously, into the Tapajós side and I think we will have a huge news flow in the future.
Peter Bell: That's exciting, so many questions to ask. Can I ask about Colider?
Michael Bennett: Sure. Go ahead.
Peter Bell: I believe you just mentioned that it was advancing through the first stage of permitting and going towards also small scale production, is that correct?
Michael Bennett: We're putting in a bulk sampling license at Colider, as well. Colider is a high-grade shear zone, so there's more copper in that particular project. We've got four holes into that high-grade shear zone, which were done several years ago. We will probably need to rethink a little bit and decide what type of metallurgy we're going to have to deal with there as it's not quite as simple as the Cajueiro project. The Cajueiro project is largely gold, but Colider has a larger copper credit.
Peter Bell: While it's several hundred kilometers as a just straight line between those two projects, so do you think that would be related potentially to a single mineralizing event, thinking maybe intrusive model here, or a different zonation with the gold and gold copper, or are they do you think separate in terms of genesis and stuff there?
Michael Bennett: I think structure is all important. I think the Cachimbo Graben, as the north is all important, but when you ask if all the rocks are all the same sort of age in the Alta Floresta belt, so I think probably the mineralizing events will be fairly similar, whether the erosion level in the north and the southern part of the belt are the same, we don't know yet. These rocks are slightly younger than Tapajós. There's a strong possibility that their sources are reserved, the sources of the different gold and base metal mineralization is still preserved.
Peter Bell: Exciting. Best of luck finding those sources.
Michael Bennett: Thank you very much Peter. We are certainly going to be doing that. As I said to you earlier in the interview, we will be looking at our out, air magnetic data and reinterpreting that, in terms of new techniques to look at the possibility of deeper sources.
Peter Bell: Helpful also to hear you mention erosion. Many times I think of differences in deposit having to do with the distance, is that a particular is from the source, through all the chemistry that's happening and changes in PH/EH, all that stuff that I don't know anything about. It was very interesting and it was great to learn a bit from Alan there about geochemistry. Wow. Helpful for me to hear that it could just be differences in erosion as well that are associated with the presence of copper versus not, up to this point. Just to offer a simpler answer, right, In some sense for me at least?
Michael Bennett: There's a lot of work still to be done. Some major companies in the past have looked at this belt. I really do believe that in the future we won't just be looking at a 2D model, we'll be looking at a 3D model here. There will be a source for this surface mineralization that we're seeing.
Peter Bell: Sometimes people talk about reinterpreting geological model. Given the historical work that was done at Cajueiro, how much of that was done but other people? How much of it was reinterpreted by you in some way?
Michael Bennett: There were just two companies involved before Altamira, that was Chapleau Resources who did a very, very limited amount of drilling back in 2007. Then ECI, which is a private company, they did quite a lot of work. I was actually involved with that company. Geophysics, geochemistry was done, but only a limited amount of drilling was one on one prospect by ECI.
Then the whole focus of the company changed to another part of the world. It wasn't the fact that the area wasn't interesting. It was just a question of timing and financing. We've now changed the focus a little bit, we've started looking at the other anomalies, which haven't previously been opened up either by trenching or investigated by drilling. Lo and behold, we're starting to find completely new targets.
Peter Bell: Maybe not necessary to describe it as reinterpreting because there wasn't much evidence to have a model in the first place prior to some of this first drilling that you guys are doing there, right?
Michael Bennett: No, I don't think there was. I think you're absolutely right. I think the new targets we've been drilling very recently have shown slightly different geology and geology, which is going to lead to probably deeper drilling in the future.
Peter Bell: Timeline, corporate side of things, anything significant that you guys have telegraphed upcoming? I guess you've got your work cut out for you.
Michael Bennett: What we're doing at the moment is going through the process of putting through the environmental licenses so that we can work freely in that area. The way it works in Brazil is that once you've gone past anything that is any different from mapping or soil sampling you need an exploration environmental license on the area, and that's what we're doing at the moment on that area.
The other areas, we have most of them published now by DNPM, which is huge, huge step. I would say that an important thing I'd like to bring out in this interview, Peter.
Brazil has had some pretty negative publicity over the last year or two, but I will say that the mining office and the environment people are now realizing that it's important to move things along a bit faster and to give foreign companies the opportunity to come in and spend money on exploration to look for things.
That really has helped us in the last year to fast track some of these permits to get ourselves into a better position and to be able to use the money that we raise in the correct way for exploration in the ground – not just sitting around, waiting for the permits to get published. I think that's very, very positive in Brazil.
I think it will cause a positive effect in bringing other companies in. Obviously, that's the nature of the game, the more people in any one area, the more is found. We think we're the forerunners of this area and we really believe in the Juruena belt. You're going to see a lot of information coming from Altamira in the next few months.
Peter Bell: Great. You guys are there and you're there in a big way. The projects that you're working on – pretty unique. I think that’s tied in with your presence in the area over years. It's good to see that you're still there exploring in Brazil! You haven't found it frustrating and been forced to leave for one reason or another. That's a good sign for others.
You mentioned the Brazilian Government and I wonder how much they have benefited from you and some of the past exploration successes. As much as Brazil gets a bad rap, I think the junior miners often get a bad rap too. If Altamira can go in there and represent the industry well, then it's for the better of all of us.
Michael Bennett: I think there is a good movement right now. Obviously, mining has more of a struggle than it did, let's say, 50 years ago in our environmental aspects but that is correct in some ways. I think modern mining can be done in much cleaner ways than it had been in the distant past.
This is something which you've got to explain to local people. It isn't just local miners walking in there and then walking out leaving a mess, we are coming in there to create jobs. Mining creates a lot of jobs. We're showing the local people that we need people to do the exploration work, that money stays in the area, and we're getting a very positive response.
Peter Bell: You say the "distant past" but it is also the not-so-distant past, right? As you say, some of the artisanal miners have left a mess in the area.
Michael Bennett: That’s right, Peter. In fact, some of the local farmers started working as miners and They don't want to see that happening again. They want to see a modern mining activity developed on their properties where they will be active partners at the end of the day in the operation. They are our allies in many respects.
Peter Bell: The issue of mercury pollution is serious. It is used in artisanal mining and the way it persists in nature is just shocking.
Michael Bennett: Yes, you're absolutely right. There was a lot of mercury in the '80s. Obviously, nobody wants to see that repeated, so we're happy to look for modern and clean methods of mining and metallurgy to recover the gold and base metals.
Peter Bell: Looking at infrastructure as well in the area, "Rio Teles Pires Hydro project near Cajueiro, grid power within two years," I'm reading from the deck there. That's a big positive for the area.
Michael Bennett: In 2007, I was working with Chapleau Resources and it took 2.5-3 hours to get from Alta Floresta, the city of Alta Floresta, to the Cajueiro projects. Now, it takes an hour. It's got an asphalt road half the way and a very well-maintained dirt road the rest of the way. As you say, the hydroelectric scheme's been very, very important to us, so in the month of October the power line will be initiated which will go right through our project area.
I think in terms of access, in terms of amenities, we're second to none. It's a project with the exploration license is now fully approved and we're going into the environmental stage. I really don't think a project like this is easily found anywhere else in Brazil right now.
Peter Bell: 40,000 hectares at Cajueiro, is that the right number?
Michael Bennett: It's around that. I haven't got the exact number in front of me here Peter.
Peter Bell: That order of magnitude?
Michael Bennett: Yes, it is.
Peter Bell: Several hundred square kilometers.
Michael Bennett: It is a big area. If we just look from one end of the property to the other end of the property, we're probably talking about in excess of 20 kilometers east-west.
Peter Bell: Right up along the river there as well?
Michael Bennett: It's along the river and that was one of the considerations for several people who came and looked at the project years ago. They were worried about the hydroelectric scheme and how it would affect the project. There's now a buffer zone of 500 meters from the river, which has been blocked out by the mining office. Any land we had in that area has been dropped. Now, all of our projects marked on the website are absolutely outside of any zone of affectation by the hydroelectric scheme.
Peter Bell: Okay. Good.
Peter Bell: The Cajueiro property is upriver a little bit from the hydro site?
Michael Bennett: Yes, upriver from the dam.
Peter Bell: OK. And is there any concern of potential flooding here?
Michael Bennett: No, the river now has a constant level because of the dam, which has been built downriver. There's no change whatsoever in the river level and there won't be any flooding as a result of that.
Peter Bell: The impact of these dams on the ability to control water flow, and storing electricity, people talk about batteries and all the innovation in battery tech that's coming down the line, hydro, big dams are a great functional battery, for all intense, and purposes, we're talking about reliable power being generated very close and feeding into the grid. That's good for you guys in terms of being able to tie into the grid yourself potentially down the line at Cajueiro. Everything is right nearby as you say with the airport in Alta Floresta. Is that a national electricity grid, or is it a state, regional one?
Michael Bennett: No, it's a national electricity grid. It feeds into the national electricity grid. It's a very important dam in the scheme of both Mato Grosso and the country itself. It's a large river. The river is about 500 meters wide and this is a very important hydroelectric scheme.
Peter Bell: Do you know any numbers and costs associated with the building of that dam – is it a billion-dollar infrastructure project here?
Michael Bennett: No, I'm afraid I don't know the numbers, Peter. It's one of several in the area. The Rio Apiacás, which goes through our project area as well has another hydroelectric scheme, and so the whole of the area is well supplied in terms of power.
Peter Bell: Wonderful. Here you guys are leading the charge. Early entrants. Have you noticed anyone else in the area around Cajueiro, any other mining companies starting to pop up that you've seen recently?
Michael Bennett: If you look at the DNPM website, there's been a lot of activity over the last couple of weeks. I think perhaps it's interesting to see that several companies lifting, really paying a lot of attention to the Juruena belt. I think Crusade has done quite a bit of drilling over the last year and a half. They have obviously found a small resource there. As I say, I think the whole belt will really start to appear in the press shortly because it's not just the surface exploration of the mineralization, which is important, it's also the possibility of deeper sources.
Peter Bell: That's clear, particularly given the large amount of historical production in the area. When you talk about hundreds of thousands of ounces being mined potentially in this area in the past by placer operations. Then you start to ask, what's still in place?
Michael Bennett: Well, several million ounces of alluvial and colluvial gold were taken out of the Alta Floresta belt in the '70s and '80s.
Peter Bell: Really?
Michael Bennett: Oh, yes.
Peter Bell: Millions of ounces?
Michael Bennett: Yeah, it was a large producer.
Peter Bell: Wow, I didn't realize it was millions of ounces. That's stunning.
Michael Bennett: Just in Cajueiro, there was probably in excess of 250,000 ounces of registered gold came out of that project. If you imagine, that it wasn't very organized back in the '80s and so the people who sold their gold to different buyers, it was hard to really figure out what the production was. Alta Floresta was a very, very important area in terms of gold production.
Peter Bell: Great. Thanks for walking me all through it here Mike. I see you're a Brazilian resident, 23 years in South America, wow. It's long time.
Michael Bennett: I've been in South America since 1983. I lived for 23 years in Bolivia. Worked with several companies there. Worked with a local mining company called, Comsur. Found the first goldmine in the east of Bolivia, the Puquio North. Worked with joint ventures with Comsur Rio Tinto Zinc, and that's where I met Alan back in the early '90s. Then went to work with a junior called, George Epps Resources in 1994. We had joint ventures with American Barrick and with Gold Fields of South Africa.
Then, I spent the next seven years of my life being a politician. I was the first foreign mayor in Bolivia. Then subsequent to that, I was the President of the Municipal Association for four years. I think that, that broad experience has helped me to understand South American people, the way things are done, how business is done, and how to treat people. I think it's been a great background for what we're doing at the moment in Brazil.
Peter Bell: I am thinking back to what you've said about the positive changes you've seen in permitting side from the Brazilian government – you have some insight of what it's like to be on that side of the table, if only just as a local mayor rather than a national mining regulator. What an interesting set of experiences you had there.
Michael Bennett: It certainly was an interesting seven years. It was a very important reflection point in my life because I think it helps you to sit down and do deals with people in more difficult situations. Sometimes the South American view is to sit down and talk it over for a while rather than just receive an offer on the table. I think it's important to understand that as a small company.
Peter Bell: We talked a bit before about how it's also the Brazilian Government getting comfortable with you guys and the juniors in general.
Michael Bennett: Over the last couple of years I spent a lot of time trying to explain our needs as a junior mining company. A junior raises money and needs to spend that money to show shareholders that it has spent the money in the correct way to give the company value. That's something I've tried to explain to the mining offices in Brazil. Without that activity, the juniors will never come back. As well, I think over the last few months that the Mining Office has really made huge inroads to speed things up by making small changes that make life for us juniors much easier in terms of our exploration possibilities.
Peter Bell: Even just the way you put it there, I would imagine that some people find it difficult to understand that a company has to spend money and particularly on something as frustrating or something that can be as frustrating as geological exploration. I can imagine if I was a government employee focused on stretching the money that we had, the resources to hear somebody say that they had to come in, that they had to spend money in an aggressive, risky fashion, it might take me a while to quite understand what they mean and to believe them, let alone adjust the rules in any small way, right, to try and accommodate? I believe that, so sometimes all it would take, simple, small changes, a place to start.
Michael Bennett: You're absolutely right Peter. It's actually all to do with timing. A lot of government offices maybe don't have the urgency to get out the permits and to give you that chance of going in there and spending that money, but that's what we as juniors need. We need to be obviously, legally completely compliant with the country's regulations, but we need that flexibility to be able to go and raise the money, and generate those results to be able to take the project down the line. I think the Brazilian Government now is making huge inroads into helping us to do that.
Peter Bell: Wonderful. I'll bring it to a close here. Is there anything else you'd like to say to everybody, or maybe contact information, or anything like that you'd like to provide?
Michael Bennett: I think on the website you'll find my email information. I obviously, I'm going to be spending my time divided between Brazil and Canada. I would like to tell everybody that it won't just be the Cajueiro project and the Crepori projects which are generating interest over the next 12 months for Altamira, that we are leading the fore in terms of exploration in the Alta Floresta gold belt. Keep an eye out for us and I think you'll see a lot of good news coming in the next few months.
Peter Bell: Thank you very much Mr. Michael Bennett, Altamira Gold. Goodbye.
Michael Bennett: Thank you Peter. It was wonderful talking to you. Thank you very much.
Please note that I have not been compensated to prepare this promotional material.
This document contains statements that are forward looking statements and are subject to various risks and uncertainties concerning the specific factors disclosed under the heading “Risk Factors” and elsewhere in the Company’s periodic filings with Canadian securities regulators. Such information contained herein represents management’s best judgment as of the date hereof based on information currently available. The Company does not assume the obligation to update any forward-looking statement.
