Botswana Diamonds has announced the acquisition of the 50% stake previously held by Alrosa in their joint venture Sunland Minerals for a nominal sum. Negotiations with a potential new partner to acquire a 50% stake in Sunland are at an advanced stage, the Company added.

The potential partner is itself a large diamond producer with new ideas and keen to find new kimberlites in Botswana and has a strong exploration team in place, the Company said, stating that once the deal is finalised, work could possibly begin in the first half of 2019 focusing on targets which have already been identified.

Giving a background to Alrosa’s exit, Botswana Diamonds said that changes in the Russian miner’s top management in 2016-17 and the subsequent shift in corporate strategy towards production and marketing, with early stage exploration joint ventures losing priority, played a key role. Initially, in early 2018, it led to operatorship of the Sunland JV being transferred to Botswana Diamonds. Further, Alrosa did not contribute additional funds to 2018 exploration, though Botswana Diamonds conducted focused work to protect the licences in the in the Gope region of the Kalahari, and finally it withdrew fully from the JV, assisting Botswana Diamonds in the search for a new partner.

The Sunland JV was established in 2014 to identify new targets – ideally large diamond-bearing kimberlites – using existing Alrosa exploration technology on Botswana Diamonds' large data base. This is a slow process requiring painstaking evaluation, refinement and selection of targets, and progress had been made, the Company averred.

John Teeling, Chairman, commented, "Alrosa has been an excellent partner over the past four years. They brought a fresh approach and new technology to exploration in the Kalahari. The work done by Sunland was and is of a high standard. We had no instant success, you rarely do in exploration, but progress had been made toward the target of a commercial discovery. For reasons unconnected with this acreage, new Alrosa management prioritised marketing over early stage exploration. This happened before, in a previous company, with the Karowe discovery.  We successfully replaced a partner, which then developed the Karowe mine.  I believe energy is more important than scale in driving innovative exploration.”

Teeling added that though no guarantees can be given at this stage, “we are at an advanced stage of discussions with a significant diamond producer who has in place an experienced exploration team. If talks are finalised I would hope that some of the targets on Sunland ground in the Kalahari, identified in 2018, will be drilled in 2019."