A site visit to Nyapanana Gold prospect was done on the month of December 2018. The aim of the visit was to allow the Mine Techs to have an appreciation of the prospect as well as to use Electromagnetic apparatus to locate the pay-zones (i.e. zones of which good grades will be picked up on the reefs), within the prospect. These will generate targets for mine development.
The scope of the survey was identification of gold bearing reefs within the Nyapanana Gold Prospect and outline the general geology of the area. The purpose of this report is to equip the Nyakuba Mining Syndicate with knowledge of the reefs on the prospect, the general geology, recommend the short-term plans and guide him on how best to mine the resource. The report also reviews the mining methods while touching on the processing methods and recommends on the cost effective strategy to mine and process in the short term.
Gold mining in the “ancients” probably ceased several centuries prior to European colonization and virtually every significant mine in Zimbabwe was first located on these old excavations. From 1904, there was a parallel expansion of organized agriculture and gold mining, largely on a small working basis. This saw the development of big mining operations in the early parts of the 20th century. Most of the mining was focused on gold mining which was developed on ancient workings. This led to the established of mines like the Globe and Phoenix Mine in Kwekwe, Cam and Motor mine in Kadoma,Conmarra in Gweru and Freda n Rebecca in Bindura among others. It is estimated that some 700 tonnes of gold were mined by the crude underhand stoping from the seventh century until the introduction of mechanized mining methods with the arrival of the European in the 1880s (Bartholomew, 1990). By the end of 1984 only 28 properties had produced more than 10 tonnes of gold amounting to 61 % of the gold reported. Gold production after independence in 1980 continued and had its highs and lows. Gold production started declining in the year 2004, when a lot of the gold mines were closing due to the political uncertainty on the country. It plunged further on 2008 due to the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe policies and hyper-inflationary environment that existed. Since then the gold production has remained low.