Large-Scale Mining Begins at Gold Mine in Southern Armenia

Large-scale mining operations have commenced at the "Lichkavaz-Tei" gold mine located in southern Armenia following a technical overhaul. This was reported by the press service of "Lichkavaz" LLC to Sputnik Armenia.

According to the report, the mining site was considered unprofitable under previous owners, and regular mining operations were not conducted there.

"In 2022, the company paid approximately 4 billion 370 million drams in taxes, which is 4.6 times more than in 2021. This occurred because the company began to generate profit after covering its losses in 2022. Moreover, the volumes of extraction remained approximately at the 2021 level. The increase in tax revenues was also due to the company beginning to pay royalties, as well as the involvement of new employees.

The ore extracted from the mine continues to be processed at the Kapan Mining and Processing Plant, which is owned by the international company Chaarat Gold.

It is noteworthy that according to an assessment by Polymetal, the resources of the Lichkavaz-Tei mine amount to 474 thousand ounces of gold (approximately 13.4 tons), as well as about 2.09 million ounces of silver and 15.9 thousand tons of copper.

In December 2019, the mine, which was previously managed by foreign owners, was acquired by Armenian citizen Sasun Avetisyan. It should be added that the term "owner" is used conditionally in relation to mines, as according to the Constitution of the Republic of Armenia, minerals belong to the state, and businesses acquire not the mines themselves, but the right to exploit them for a certain period of time.