Six Projects, One Country: Eastport Critical Metals' Botswana Strategy

Trevor Hall (0:30)

We have a question at Semarule, and thick copper intervals at Matsutama Copper Asset. The Fraser Institute ranks Botswana as one of Africa's most attractive mining jurisdiction. Daniel Major is CEO. Daniel, welcome to Mining Stock Daily.

Daniel Major (0:45)

Michael, thank you very much for the invitation to join you.

Trevor Hall (0:49)

Matsutama is one of your flagships, Daniel. It's 1,845 square kilometers sitting between two copper mines. Matsutama has a historical deposit. For listeners new to the story, you did have a drilling campaign. What have you proved since you've wrapped up that campaign?

Daniel Major (1:09)

Yeah, as you said, very large area of ground, almost 2,000 kilometers squared with its two mines.

We were only listed in November. And so part of that listing document was the competent persons report that went with it. And the company initially focused on the recommendations of that report that related to an area which had a deposit called Nacalacuana.

That drilling was really targeted to prove that worked, to validate it. We drilled into NAC main and proved up that the 10 million pounds at almost half a percent was valid. We drilled out at NAC East and NAC Main, NAC West, which gave us about a 10-kilometer strike length. What that really showed is that we got long intersections of copper there, about 100-meter consistent copper running at about 0.2 percent, and in many cases, intersection is quite high inside of that. And what that really showed is the relink between the copper, the structure around NAC, and gave us a 10-meter strike. But it was really the starting point for us of just getting on the ground and doing the work. The markers that you've already alluded to, having two copper mines, one with 1 percent copper, almost 100 million tons, the other one at 2 percent at Takadu, show there's copper there. Soil sampling that's been done shows there's literally copper everywhere across that project. So our next step is to step back, actually, and look at geophysics on some of the bigger areas up there, particularly La Pache Snake, where we've got a 30 kilometer long soil anomaly, major folding structure and faults, and folding geology. And we kind of think, you know, that's on the same trend as the Moana copper mine, all this other stuff going on, which you need to infuse copper into the rocks is happening. We know we've got copper elsewhere. We're looking for the beast that's on the property.

Trevor Hall (3:31)

So when does the next drilling campaign start? And what are going to be your top targets?

Daniel Major (3:38)

Yeah, so the next stage we're already underway, which is the gravity work. I mean, it is, you know, we're doing a gravity survey over 291 square kilometers. And these are big bits of ground, as you can appreciate. Anywhere in the world, they're big bits of ground.

That should be completed by the end of October. On the basis of the results of that, we will then run EM surveys. Gravity, obviously giving us a more two-dimensional view with some 3D EM costing more, but also giving us a much more three-dimensional view, looking for the sulfide targets themselves. So sometime probably Q1 and going into Q2, we will start drilling into the EM targets that are defined. And so hopefully, you know, within the 12-month window that we set ourselves, we will have made discovery, which is really what we're looking to do.

Trevor Hall (4:34)

Let's swing to your rare earth. That would be a Semarule. Clearly has size. You reported more than 300 meters of mineralization in all three holes. Grades are running somewhere between 0.13 to 0.21 percent total rare earth oxide. Can you talk about grade and scale at the Semarule?

Daniel Major (4:54)

Yeah. In Semarule, the Sinite target that we went after is 15 square kilometers, three by five. And within that, there was a smaller band that we were going after, more like one and a half to two square kilometers. The company drilled a total of eight holes, and there were two prior holes drilled by the Botswana Geoscience Institute as well. There were holes one and two. We have announced a number of those holes.

Most recent ones were holes seven and six. And just for those who, you know, we're on radio, to put an image here, you're looking almost at a fence in between five, seven and six, which is about 1.2 kilometers in length across the anomaly that's sitting there. Hole five turned out to be the strongest of these. You're right, it was 320 meters of continuous mineralization at 0.21.

And hole seven, similar grade out to 347 meters. The grade fades away as you get out to hole six. So it's clearly the edge of what it is on the northeast side. Well, what was interesting as well, in hole five, the first 50 meters of it runs at 0.64.