This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily on August 2, 2018

KUALA LUMPUR: Sandakan-based Borneo Aqua Harvest Bhd (Bahvest) said it had commenced its gold production commercially following the commissioning of the gold processing plant in Tawau, Sabah. It has also yielded its maiden gold dore bar, it added.

In a filing with Bursa Malaysia yesterday, Bahvest said it will make the appropriate monthly production announcement in due course.

The company entered into the gold mining business through buying a mining special-purpose vehicle Wullersdorf Resources Sdn Bhd (WRSB), which was 70% owned by its managing director Datuk Lo Fui Ming, for RM131 million last year.

In March 2017, Lo told The Edge Financial Daily in an interview that the group expects to see the full impact from the gold mining business from the financial year ending March 31, 2019.

WRSB has obtained a 33-year sublease to set up a gold mining operation on a 317.7ha plot in Bukit Mantri, Tawau from Southsea Gold Sdn Bhd.

The plot is part of a 1,000ha parcel that Southsea had secured mining rights to for 35 years — from Jan 1, 2014 to Dec 31, 2048 — from the Sabah government.