Location and History
The Soto Norte Gold Project is located within the traditional mining area of California – Vetas, located approximately 350 km north of Bogota and 55 km northeast of the city of Bucaramanga, the capital of the Department of Santander.
In December 2005, Ventana Gold Corporation (“Ventana”), a TSX listed Canadian company, acquired various small-scale tenements from artisanal miners and formed the La Bodega exploration Project, and conducted surface exploration, diamond drilling, and a preliminary economic assessment of the La Bodega Project. In 2011, EBX Group, via AUX Canada, announced the successful acquisition of Ventana for US$1.4B, and changed the project name to El Gigante. AUX consolidated the adjacent Calvista Gold and Galway Resources properties in December 2012.
Mubadala Investment Company (“Mubadala”) took over ownership of AUX in February 2015 and renamed the company to Sociedad Minera de Santander S.A.S. (“Minesa”) and the project to Soto Norte. Since 2015, Minesa has undertaken extensive consultation and invested significant resources in engaging with the local communities in preparing an initial Environmental and Social Impact Assessment (ESIA). Following detailed technical feedback from the Colombian environmental regulatory authority (ANLA) in 2021, Minesa began drafting a new ESIA to include a robust Quality Assurance and Quality Control process for regulatory compliance.
In March 2022, Aris Mining became operator of the Soto Norte project and has prepared a NI43-101 Feasibility Study with an effective date of 1 January 2021 that was authored by SRK, SNC-Lavalin and Minesa.
"As operator, Aris Mining’s team is contributing its knowledge and experience and ensuring a respectful consultation process with the local stakeholders and is leading and advancing the drafting and submission of a new ESIA. Delimitation of the Páramo de Santurbán, a protected area of the Andes, was completed in June 2023 and supported by the four municipalities surrounding the Soto Norte Project. The delimitation was completed in alignment with local, regional, and national government, as well as local communities. The Company expects the Colombian Ministry of Environment to issue its final resolution of the delimitation in H2 2023.
Aris Mining is also evaluating opportunities to support rolling out a Small-Scale Miners Program at Soto Norte, based on the highly successful model developed at the Segovia Operations. The Company also expects to have its flagship partner-operated mining program in Soto Norte, with the Calimineros group, to start operations in Q1 2024. While the Soto Norte project progresses toward construction, the Company plans to process the material mined by Calimineros at the Segovia Operations’ Maria Dama processing plant.
Soto Norte will be a significant project for the local and regional communities, providing employment and skills training for up to 1,800 construction contractors and up to 940 full time operations employees, and a strategy to procure goods and services from the regional community.”