AFX News Limited -
http://www.forbes.com/finance/feeds/afx/2006/07/27/afx2908443.html

27th July 2006

MANILA (XFN-ASIA) - Canadian mining company TVI Pacific is investing 23 mln usd to develop a copper and zinc mine and is looking to buy into others in the southern Philippines, the company said.

‘We would like to grow the company, that’s the strategy,’ said Yulo Perez, manager of local affiliate TVI Resource Development Philippines Inc, which is producing 1,800 tonnes of gold and silver ore per day at a mine in the Canatuan mountains in the southern Philippines.

The current operation is projected to be mined out in 2008 and the Vancouver-based parent is investing 23 mln usd this year to build a production facility for the copper and zinc sulphides underneath the gold and silver ore, Perez told a news conference.

He said the company is also looking to acquire existing mining assets elsewhere on the main southern island of Mindanao and is in talks with a local outfit called North Davao Mining over a copper and gold mine in the area.

The mine adjoins a gold site at Mount Diwata in southeastern Mindanao.

TVI Resource Development president Eugene Mateo told Agence France-Presse the company on its own is pushing exploration work in a wide area around Canatuan and could develop another gold site near Bayog town on Mindanao’s Zamboanga peninsula.