Black Wattle Colliery acquires coal reserves

BISICHI MINING PLC Black Wattle Colliery, finalises deal on high quality contiguous reserve Bisichi Mining PLC ('Bisichi'), the mining company with direct coal mining operations in South Africa, is pleased to announce that its principal South African subsidiary, Black Wattle Colliery ('Black Wattle'), has concluded an agreement with Blue Nightingale Trading 817 (Pty) Ltd ("Blue Nightingale"), to purchase Run of Mine coal from an opencast reserve of coal contiguous to Black Wattle's existing opencast mine. The reserve consists of approximately three million metric tonnes of high quality low phosphorous run of mine coal with an average opencast stripping ratio of 2.8 to 1. The agreement with Blue Nightingale, a black owned and managed mining company, includes the implementation of a skills transfer programme. This transaction was concluded immediately after Blue Nightingale had acquired from the Department of Mineral Resources the relevant mining approvals for a large portion of the reserve. Opening of the opencast pit is to commence immediately with first Run of Mine coal expected to be received by Black Wattle in December 2010. Andrew Heller, Managing Director of Bisichi, said: 'We are very pleased to be involved with Blue Nightingale in the development of this reserve, which is a significant addition to our own existing opencast operations. The conclusion of this agreement will have a significant impact on Black Wattle's development and life of mine. The high quality low phosphorous coal which will be mined from the new reserve can be sold either into the domestic metallurgical markets at a premium price or the export market and we look forward to taking advantage of this as production from the reserve increases in 2011.' END For further information, please call: Andrew Heller, Bisichi Mining PLC 020 7415 5030

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