Japanese zinc producer Mitsui Mining & Smelting and trading house Itochu have signed an agreement with Canada’s Selkirk Metals for a 50% stake in the Ruddock Creek zinc mine, located 500 km northeast of Vancouver, they said in a joint statement Thursday.
The three companies are keen to launch commercial production of zinc and lead-in-concentrate as soon as possible, and are targeting the completion of feasibility studies in less than a year.
Construction of mining facilities will begin in 2014, and mining operations in 2015, according Yushu Sugiura, spokesman at Mitsui Mining & Smelting.