Americas

PLANS IN PLACE TO REALISE GROWTH POTENTIAL

In the Americas region, an important growth area for the company, AngloGold Ashanti has:

• in Argentina, the Cerro Vanguardia mine;
• in Brazil, two business units, AngloGold Ashanti Córrego do Sítio Mineração (AGA Mineração) and the Serra Grande operation; and
• in the United States, the Cripple Creek & Victor (CC&V) mine.

Combined production from these operations increased by 6% to 891,000oz of gold in 2011, increasing its contribution to group production to 21% (2010: 19%).

Total cash costs increased by 22% to $528/oz. Total capital expenditure for the region was $456m, an increase of 47% on the $311m spent in 2010. The bulk of this was expended at AGA Mineração, CC&V and Cerro Vanguardia projects.

The stronger real and scarce mining skills along with accelerating inflation across the South American jurisdictions presented significant cost pressures during the year.

In all, 7,389 people, including contractors, were employed, 807 more than in 2010.

Regrettably, two contractor employees lost their lives in occupational accidents during 2011. The first was in Brazil where a worker was run over by a tractor on a construction site, and the second was in Colombia where a worker was inundated by a naturally occurring landslide after unusually heavy rainfall. An all injury frequency rate of 6.33 per million hours worked (2010: 5.66) was achieved in 2011.

The total attirbutable Mineral Resource for the Americas region was 49Moz at the end of 2011 and the attributable Ore Reserve 11Moz.

A far-reaching greenfield exploration programme is underway in the Americas region, most notably in Colombia, South America, where AngloGold Ashanti has extensive land holdings. Two significant greenfield discoveries – Gramalote and La Colosa – together account for 18Moz of the Americas’ Mineral Resource.

Exploration activities are conducted by either AngloGold Ashanti teams or together with joint venture partners, in Canada, Brazil and Argentina. See the Global exploration section of this report.