Endeavour’s huge gold discovery at Tanda-Iguela shines a spotlight on Cote D’Ivoire

The mining spotlight fell again on Cote D’Ivoire last week, after Endeavour Mining PLC (LSE:EDV, TSX:EDV, OTCQX:EDVMF), the West African gold mining specialist, announced a three million ounce discovery there at its Tanda-Iguela property.

It’s not the first big discovery to be made in Ivory Coast.

Indeed, several companies, including Endeavour, already operate sizeable mines there.

But the news does serve to emphasise just how prospective the country remains.

Relatively speaking, compared to its neighbour to the east, Ghana, Cote D’Ivoire remains underexplored.

The reasons for that are both geological and historic.

Ghana’s famous Ashanti district has been able to support a major regional mining industry for decades and, until it was gobbled up by Anglo Gold relatively recently, was the home turf of one of the world’s most influential independent gold miners, Ashanti Gold.

Cote D’Ivoire, despite its larger size, has produced no such global champion, and there are no mines in Cote D’Ivoire that compare to Obuasi in Ghana, which was first worked in 1897 and which is still reckoned to have a 20-year mine life.

Nevertheless, it’s not pushing the boat out too much to argue that the closest comparable company  we have today to the old Ashanti Gold is Endeavour Mining itself.

After all, Endeavour is now developing into something of a regional champion in Francophone West Africa.

The company's strategy has focused on cultivating high quality, low cost assets with long mine lives and strong exploration potential, and hasn’t been afraid to swap out the weaker elements of its portfolio.

It’ll be interesting to see how the new discovery at Tanda-Iguela fits into this strategy.Indeed, Mining.com called the discovery at Tanda-Iguela a potential “flagship asset” for Endeavour, which given the quality of its other assets, isn’t faint praise.

And Sébastien de Montessus, Endeavour’s chief executive, argued that the Tanda-Iguela discovery “ranks as one of the most significant discoveries made in West Africa over the past decade.”

Whatever the long-term strategy, in the more immediate term Endeavour is going to get back to work. Around 70,000 metres worth of drilling on Tanda-Iguela is planned for next year, and the upside that’s on offer looks considerable.

So, while Cote D’Ivoire isn’t yet challenging for Ghana’s crown as the go-to gold destination in West Africa, Endeavour is certainly furthering the country’s claim.

Following on from the Tanda-Iguela news, Endeavour has also recently announced that the measured and indicated resource at Ity, one of Endeavour’s flagship assets  in Cote D’Ivoire, now amounts to more than five million ounces.

So plenty of big things are happening in Cote D’Ivoire, with other companies, like Centamin and Perseus and Montage Gold, all active there too.