AN INTERVIEW WITH BERNARD LAPOINTEPRESIDENT AND CEO WITH D’ARIANNE RESOURCES
The markets remain in turmoil and these things usually take awhile to sort out, but we must still keep track of interesting on-going stories. People gotta eat, so we need agriculture, andthese days agriculture needs ever more fertilizer. Time for anupdate on D’Arianne Resources, and we go to Jed Richardsonand Bernard Lapointe, President of DAN.
David Pescod: Jed and Bernard just announced some testsshowing that you've got some pretty good quality fertilizer inyour hand in Quebec, just what should we know about thisquality and by the way, any guesstimates yet as to the size ofthis project?
Bernard Lapointe: Currently, we’re sitting on indicated re-sources of 78.3mt at 7.24% P205 and inferred resources of260.2mt at 5.7% P205. So, the potential is there for a verylarge scale project. A new resource will accompany a pre-feasibility study expected in the next few weeks, so we willhave a clearer picture then. But what I can tell you now is thatour recent drilling campaign both upgraded and expanded themineralized area at the Manouane Zone and the Paul Zone. Sowe believe that the scope of the resource should lead to amine life of 25 years or more, and our current planned produc-tion of 2MMt per year could potentially support a lot more.
DP: There are different types of fertilizers, so for a personnew to this kind of story, what should we know about the fer-tilizers and what it is you have?
BL: More than 90% of mined phosrock ends up in NPK fertil-izer blends that require specific quantities of the chemical.Grade is, therefore, very important in a phosphate story. Thehigher the concentrate, the better. Arianne is able to achieve aconcentrate grading 38% P2O5 with no contaminants, wherethe industry norm would be 30-32% with some level of cad-mium and other harmful radioactive minerals. The advantageof what we’ve got is that there’s more phosphate in everytonne, and none of the stuff you don’t want. For end users,that means phosphoric acid can be produced at a significantlylower cost.
DP: The location you suggest is a good one, though take alook at a map of the world and it kind of looks northerly, com-ments please?
BL: Northerly yes, but close to the Dolbeau rail head andSaguenay fjord which is a deep water port, giving us inex-pensive access to the North American market and worldmarkets. Being situated in Northern Quebec is working outto be beneficial to the company, in that the Lac à Paul Pro-ject should qualify project to receive assistance in Quebec'sPlan Nord economic stimulus initiative for sustainable in-dustrial development north of the 49th parallel. The areacomprises all the necessary infrastructure of a modern min-ing operation including access to hydro-electric power andan employable local workforce eager for new opportunity tosupplement the declining logging industry.
DP: Besides the fertilizer there are a lot of questions beingasked about the titanium there and whether it is of any valueor should a person just ignore those hopes/thoughts?
BL: No need to ignore those hopes. We share them too. Asa company, there’s a quiet optimism about the potentialvalue add of the titanium deposits at Lac à Paul. To get abetter idea of what’s there, we will complete some studieson recoveries and concentration grades for titanium as a by-product before year-end. We need to understand the eco-nomic parameters before we complete a scoping study.
DP: Would you have any ideas about the developments andexpected news flow between now and Christmas for some-one following the story?
BL: Arianne will be releasing some important news over thesecond half of 2011. With regard to phosphate the pre-feasibility study and the resource update should be ready inthe next 3 to 4 weeks. We will also be testing new phosphatetargets on the Lac à Paul property through Q4. For the tita-nium we will be conducting the tests I mentioned and aim tocomplete a scoping study early next year. Looking ahead to2012, a BFS on the phosphate is planned for H1.
DP: The obvious and hope-for exit for the company is atakeover sometime down the road. With developments atMosaic and elsewhere in the fertilizer business, any com-ments you would care to make or for that matter, can makeat a time like this?
BL: Quebec is one of the best places to do business. TheFraser institute ranks it in the top 5 jurisdictions in the worldfor mining operations. Not to celebrate another’s misfor-tune, but problems in Florida for Mosaic, and growing con-cern about projects in Peru for Mosaic, Vale and some of thesmaller developers makes me very happy our project is inmining friendly Quebec.
