Poised to become a mid-tier gold producer

Gold was first discovered in the South Rand area in 1887, leading to the establishment of a number of small mines and prospects that operated, intermittently, from 1892 to 1962. The Heidelberg-Roodepoort Mine was the largest single historical producer in the area. The Kimberley Reef was well developed in the Heidelberg-Roodepoort Mine, and gold mineralization was consistent making extraction viable over the full mine lease area. Operations were eventually terminated in 1942 when mining encountered a fault at a depth of 300 m that vertically displaced the Reef. The displaced portion was later mined from the Kildare Gold Mine property.

Exploration drilling in the Burnstone Property area was conducted intermittently during the period 1974 to 1993; initially by Union Corporation Ltd., and later by Gencor. Anglovaal Ltd (presently known as Avgold Ltd) also drilled a number of holes during this period. Southgold Exploration (Pty) Ltd (“Southgold”), a privately owned resource company drilled three boreholes, during the late 1990s and early 2000, and drilled an additional 15 boreholes from May to July 2002. Southgold then commissioned Global Geo Services to geologically model the deposit and estimate a resource contained in an area that approximates the now called Area 1 gold deposit on the Burnstone Property.

In November 2002, Great Basin Gold entered into an option agreement with Southgold, to purchase up to 100% of Southgold on a phased basis. Southgold hence became a wholly owned subsidiary of Great Basin Gold. At the time the Company signed the option agreement with Southgold, the Burnstone Property encompassed 26,470 hectares. Since then, Southgold and Great Basin Gold have actively secured additional land holdings in the area, and have divested their interest in lands of little geological merit. As a result, the Burnstone Property now encompasses approximately 35,000 hectares.

In addition, mineral rights to 4% of the measured and indicated mineral resources on the Burnstone Property were previously held by Puma Gold Ltd (“Puma”), however, in July 2008 the Company acquired the entire shareholding of Puma for US$ 6million, thereby securing the entire resource.

Timeline