Jangada Mines, a natural resources company developing what it describes as South America’s largest and most advanced PGM project, has announced a substantial increase of the JORC compliant mineral resources at its Pedra Branca PGM project in north-eastern Brazil, which enhances the already positive economics of the Project.

The independently assessed, substantial JORC resource increases across commodity basket:

• 50% increase in global ore volume to 34.5 Mt at 1.3 g/t PGM+Au
• 53% increase in PGM resource to 1.45 Moz
• 28% increase in nickel resource to 140 Mlb
• 11% increase in copper resource to 26 Mlb
• 4% increase in cobalt resource to 6.7 Mlb

The increase in resources has been obtained from the inclusion of the Santo Amaro prospect to inferred resources. Six more known targets are to be evaluated across the 50,000-ha licence, providing the potential for additional major upside in future resource figures.

• Metallurgical test work results expected soon closely followed by the publication of further technical assessment
• Scale, polymetallic nature and jurisdiction, increase wider industry importance of Pedra Branca.

Brian McMaster, Executive Chairman of Jangada, said: “The increase in the JORC resource by half a million ounces of PGMs and the strengthening of major base metal credits including nickel, copper and cobalt, all significant commodities in the electric battery economy, are expected to have a major material impact on the already positive economics of Pedra Branca.  Importantly, we have a further six known targets to explore which, with the overall district expansion potential, translates to Pedra Branca being potentially much larger and of significantly greater value than originally anticipated.

“With the increase in scale and the realisation of significant base metal credits, we have been working hard to understand the project’s true potential and its optimal development path.  Metallurgical test work including flow sheets will be published imminently, which will be closely followed by the publication of further technical assessment.

“We believe this is an industry important project given that it’s not located in the increasingly expensive, and geopolitical turbulent, historical areas of PGM exploitation; and it has scale, grade and credits.  We are therefore excited about its development path and look forward to quantifying further value, which has already been transformed since listing.”

Pedra Branca is located 280 km from the port city of Fortaleza in the northeast of Brazil and comprises of three mining licences and 43 exploration licences over an area of 50,000 ha.  Following the evaluation of the Santo Amaro prospect, the JORC (2012) compliant resource has been increased to approximately 1.45 Moz of PGM+Au at a grade of 1.3g/t PGM+Au (2.5 g/t Pd Eq), 140 Mlb of nickel, 26 Mlb of copper and 6.7 Mlb of cobalt.  Importantly, the company has six more known targets across the licence providing the potential for additional major upside in future resource figures.