according to comments made at the end of the recent conference call, the next big round of projects for kinross is expected to come on line in 2013-14. first is lobo-marte in 2013. lobo marte is expected to have capex of $500 million, and produce 350,000 oz of gold per year with costs of $12.50/ton. strong copper prices may improve the economics of cerro casale, and they are looking at ways of locking in the copper price, and using copper offtake to finance the project. if all goes as planned (ha ha) fruta del norte will also start up in 2013, and cerro casale in 2014. so if and when those projects ramp up on time, we would see a steep increase in production in 2014-15, and then flatten out around 2017.

there are now 4 drills on site at fruta del norte, and they are waiting for final approval from the mmp. a new minister was inaugurated a few days ago, and they expect approval soon. iamgold is also waiting, so it looks like the delay is not specific to kinross. most of the drilling will be infill, although there will be some step-outs (no info on where those might be) and it will take six months after approval to complete the program for a new resource estimate. the engineering work for pre-feasibility will be going on in parallel, so that should be complete shortly after the drilling is done.