Colombia-focused Gran Colombia Gold (TSX:GCM) announced today that gold production for the first quarter of 2018 reached 52,672 ounces, a growth of 35 per cent when compared to the same quarter of 2017.
"This brings the Company's trailing 12-months' total gold production to 187,485 ounces, up 8% from 2017's annual production of 173,821 ounces and within the Company's production guidance for 2018 of between 182,000 and 193,000 ounces," the miner said in a press release.
The firm's Segovia operation, located in the Segovia-Remedios mining district of Antioquia, was responsible for the positive performance. Only in March, gold production from the high-grade mine reached 16,611 ounces, bringing the total for the first quarter of 2018 to 46,472 ounces. According to Gran Colombia, this represents a growth of 42 per cent when compared to the first quarter of 2017.
The mine, which was hit last year by a 42-day strike, is expected to produce between 158,000 and 167,000 ounces of gold by the end of 2018.
The Marmato operation, which is located in the heart of the Middle Cauca gold district, did not perform as well as Segovia, Gran Colombia revealed. Total production for the first quarter of 2018 was of 6,200 ounces compared with 6,240 ounces in the first quarter of 2017.
By December, Marmato is expected to have produced between 24,000 and 26,000 ounces of the yellow metal. The deposit contains total estimated resources of approximately 8 million ounces of gold and almost 38 million ounces of silver.