PETROPAVLOVSK-KAMCHATSKY, September 05. /ITAR-TASS/. The development of the Ozernovskoye gold field has started in Russia’s Far Eastern Kamchatka Krai, head of the Siberian Mining and Metallurgical Alliance (SiGMA) Dmitry Filichkin said on Friday.

SiGMA signed with the regional administration a relative investment agreement on Friday, Filichkin said at the Far East 2014 investment forum. According to him, the company will invest about $335 million in gold mining in Kamchatka.

The launch of the first phase of the goldfield and a mining and concentrating mill at the site will give the annual gold production of two tonnes, Filichkin said. And the project’s second phase will boost gold production to five tonnes by 2020. The cost of the development of the first phase of the Ozernovskoye field is estimated at $140 million, which the company intends to attract from Sberbank as project financing. The initial geological exploration was conducted with funds of the project investors.

“The field’s reserves have not been fully explored, the proven gold reserves are about 107 tonnes,” the SiGMA head said. After the implementation of the project’s first phase, the company would continue the field’s geological exploration, he added.

“We regard it as promising, so after the field’s reserves are specified, we will know the amount of investment in the second phase,” he said.

Filichkin said that the sum of $335 million needed to be invested in the whole project was the “minimum required amount.”

Russia’s gold production in 2013 increased by 12.6%, compared to 2012 and reached 254.24 tonnes.