Eastern Platinum and Northam Platinum have made announcements of increased projected output of platinum group metals (pgms).

Eastern Platinum today issued a revised reserve and resource estimates for its South African operations, totalling more than 100 million ounces of pgms.

Moreover, the viability of these operations is boosted by the fact that the "resources are platinum-rich, occur at relatively shallow depth and have infrastructure already in place", the firm's President and Chief Executive Officer Ian Rozier added.

Meanwhile, Eastern Platinum has confirmed that preliminary studies of its Booysendal platinum projects show it could double production, with estimates suggesting it has a combined resource of 112 million ounces of pgms.

The pre-feasiblity study on the mine is expected to be complete by early 2008 with construction set to begin late 2009.

News of projected increases in the firms' output is expected to boost the South African platinum sector, where production has recently been hit by a series of strikes and mine closures.

Source:

Eastplats has more than 100m oz PGMs in SA, 07/12/07
http://www.miningweekly.co.za/article.php?a_id=123070

Northam forecasts continuing robust demand for PGMs in 2008, 07/12/07
http://www.miningweekly.co.za/article.php?a_id=122511

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