* S.African govt ploughs $420 mln into new platinum venture
* Production target of 1.1 mln oz/year
* Firm would be world’s third largest producer
* To create 9,000 direct jobs
(Adds detail, quotes)
By Sherilee Lakmidas
JOHANNESBURG, March 29 (Reuters) – South Africa’s government
is to plough $420 million into a public-private platinum venture
with Pallinghurst Resources that has ambitions to
become the world’s third-largest producer of the precious metal.
The partnership, which includes the local Bakgatla Ba
Kgafela tribe, has a production target of 1.1 million ounces
within the next five years. That would make it the biggest
producer behind Anglo American Platinum and Impala
Platinum.
Pallinghurst chairman Brian Gilbertson, a South African
miner who made a name for himself at global giant BHP Billiton,
said the new company’s mines were open-cast and shallow
operations that would last at least 30 years.
Other platinum mines in South Africa, home to 80 percent of
world supplies, are getting deeper and more expensive, leading
to a levelling off of their output. Deeper mines are also more
dangerous.
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