North Zamboanga Exploration Tenements
At A Glance | |
Ownership | TVI Resource Development Philippines Inc. – 100% |
Location | Tenements covering 1,240 square kilometers in the Zamboanga Peninsula.The tenements occupy the northeastern corner of the province closer to the boundary of Misamis Occidental province. |
Business activities | Gold and copper exploration |
Logistics | Within trucking distance of port facilities within the Zamboanga Peninsula |
The North Zamboanga tenements consist of 11 permit applications covering 1,240 square kilometers or 161,953 hectares distributed northeast to east of TVIRD’s Balabag Gold -Silver Project.
The tenements occupy a highly mineral prospective region in southern Mindanao characterized by a highly complex syn- to post-collisional tectonic setting lying along and immediately east of the active Siayan-Sindangan Suture Zone (SSSZ). The initiation, activation and the sustained-prolonged movements along the major SSSZ fault zone have produces secondary northeast trending dilational structures and/or tension gashes and the emplacement of the plutono-volcanic rocks with associated magmatic and mineralized fluids. The geologic setting along this region has been favorable in hosting different styles of mineralization consisting of porphyry copper and gold, base metals and gold skarns and low to high sulphidation epithermal style of gold mineralization.
The current permit applications cover several mineral targets identified by a prior exploration program, numbering over 20 epithermal gold, copper and gold skarn, massive sulphide and porphyry copper-gold prospects. Reconnaissance to follow -up geological work carried out to date has supported historical findings and has resulted in the discovery of additional prospects of interest. Indications of mineralization often occur on the surface and have been easily accessible.
Regional appraisal through airborne magnetic/radiometric survey was done for the whole northern tenements in 2009 to 2010 resulting to delineations of several geophysical anomalies that are indicative of potential gold, silver, base-metal and porphyry copper prospects. In 2011, VTEM survey was flown on 2 smaller areas with suspected VMS mineralization, namely (1) Canibongan at Roxas town and (2) Suricon’s White Eagle Mine at Dumingag.
Ground truthing over known Au and Ag mineralization were implemented in 2021 -2022 and have identified several epithermal gold prospects. Among the epithermal gold prospects identified in the North Zamboanga tenement package, is the Bonbon area, which showed potential Au -Ag mineral resource wherein mineralization is defined by series of north-northwest trending quartz veinlets/stockworks in highly altered volcanic and intrusive rocks, spread over a 10-kilometer-long by 2-kilometer-wide area. Bonbon area is covered by an 81 square kilometer (50 square mile) Exploration Permit Application. The recent follow -up geologic mapping and sampling done over Bonbon area has further resulted in delineating potential gold prospects that are planned to be subjected to ground geophysical survey and drilling.
MPSA processing and approval are on hold due to the ongoing moratorium on new permit applications imposed by the Secretary of the Department of the Environment and Natural Resources (DENR). In March 2013, the DENR lifted the moratorium on application for exploration permits but retained the moratorium on MPSAs and financial or technical assistance agreements despite the signing of the much-awaited Executive Order by the President of the Philippines. To date, the timing as to the actual issuance of permits continues to be uncertain.
In July 2018, the DENR lifted the Moratorium on the acceptance, processing and/or approval of Exploration Permit applications. The order took effect in 10 August 2018.
With the lifting of the Moratorium, a number of TVIRD exploration permit applications that have been identified to contain significant Au and Ag mineralization are now being processed towards getting the required exploration permits. The approval of these priority exploration mining tenements will enable TVIRD to fully explore its North Zamboanga Tenements.