Goldplat plc (LON:GDP) Chief Executive Officer Gerard Kisbey-Green caught up with DirectorsTalk for an exclusive interview to discuss profitability, their focus on Kilimapesa, new appointments and the impact of the gold price
Q1: Now your second quarter of profitability, is this sustainable and are you happy with the performance during the quarter?
A1: Yes, I think in a word, yes I’m happy with the performance. We said at the interim stage that those numbers were sustainable and I think this quarter has kind of proven that. We have had a good quarter, we’ve remained profitable at the two recovery operations, both Ghana and South Africa, and we should be able to repeat those numbers and Kilimapesa remains unprofitable which is public knowledge and we were very happy that we managed to reduce the loss there but we hope to negate those losses by the end of the calendar year. So we are very happy with the performance, this is sustainable with the upside in Ghana and sustainability in South Africa so we’re very happy with the way the year’s going.
Q2: It seems that you have decided to focus on Kilimapesa, can you expand on this?
A2: Yes, I guess it goes back to the previous question, Goldplat are sustaining losses in Kenya, Kilimapesa, it’s just a matter of upping the process and the capacity and the mining rate to get to a profitable situation. We’ve not taken the decision to commit to that, I think we’ve announced that we’re going to move the plant from Ghana to Kenya, that is happening now, and it has to be a single minded focus of ours, we’ve pulled the trigger, so to speak, so we’re going to do it and we’ve committed the capital. We hope that by the end of the calendar year we’ll be able to report to the market that we are at least breaking even, it’s not mildly positive in terms of profitability at the Kilimapesa mine.
Q3: You announced some potential new appointments, can you elaborate a little further on their significance?
A3: Yes, absolutely. Goldplat’s focus is really, as said, on Kilimapesa and thereafter the strategic sourcing of materials, in other words to secure the right amount of good quality material for all of our different operations. It’s an area where the senior management team have been having to spend quite a lot of effort and we’ve been looking for and think we’ve found a very competent Strategic Sourcing Manager who will fulfil that function initially in South Africa and potentially thereafter elsewhere, it’s a very key placement for us and I think we’ve found somebody and hope to announce quite shortly the appointment of somebody for that role. Also to free up time of particularly the Chief Operating Officer we’re making a new appointment of a General Manager at the South African plant and again, we’ve shortlisted them and we think we’re very close to making a decision on a very good appointment there. Apart from the actual operational issues, this does free up the senior executives’ time to spend more time on strategic issues so that’s the significance there.
Q4: Now the gold price seems to have turned, do you think that this is the start of a sustained better gold price and what kind of impact do you think this have on Goldplat’s profitability?
A4: Clearly it has picked up really nicely and in fact in some of the low currencies, specifically South Africa, we’re seeing record ever Rand gold prices and that’s obviously good for us. I think what is most significant for me is that over the last while whilst the gold prices have been low, we have proved that we can still be profitable and moreover than that we actually proved everything, we poured money back into capital expenditure and replacing redundant equipment, buying new equipment, building new plants and we got through that over the last few years. So really any uptake in the gold price now, notwithstanding inflationary aspects, should drop through to the bottom line so has it turned, all the people I’m talking now think that it matters but we’re happy where it is and we know that we’re profitable so we’re very happy and if it’s turned that’s fantastic, we welcome that.
