National Park Authority gives Scotgold the go-ahead at Cononish

Scotgold Resources has received confirmation from the Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park Planning Authority (NPA) that all of the 19 pre-start conditions and other obligations, relating its planning application ‘2017/0254/MIN’, had now been discharged, it announced on Wednesday.

The AIM-traded said that as a result, its subsidiary SGZ Cononish would initiate development activities at its Cononish Gold and Silver Project on Wednesday.

Its board thanked the NPA, the consultees who had responded to its submissions, and “the many other stakeholders” for what it called constructive input in its statement.

Scotgold said that while the complexity of the process had resulted in an extended timeline, Cononish could now move forward into the development phase with a “more thorough understanding” of the issues of concern to the various parties.

“We are delighted to have reached this point and are looking forward to a very exciting 2019, bringing the Cononish Project into production,” said Scotgold chief executive officer Richard Gray.

“We can now put our Implementation plans into action and anticipate the first rock breaking activities at the Cononish mine portal starting early in the New Year.

“We hope our many stakeholders will follow us on this journey, culminating in first gold production planned for end of 2019.”