PHNOM PENH, Sept. 14 (Xinhua) -- The Ministry of Mines and Energy has issued Cambodia's first commercial underground mining license to the Indian company Mesco Gold, local media reported Wednesday.
After waiting for more than two years, Mesco Gold said it received the extraction license on Monday, according to the Cambodia Daily.
The company said it was ready to begin work in northeastern Ratanakkiri province, and preparation work on the site in O'yadaw district has already been underway starting on Aug. 15.
"It's an underground mine. If you're going underground, you're going to have to drill and blast," Mesco Gold's operations director Harsh Sharma was quoted as saying by the newspaper.
He explained that the company now needed to apply for an explosives license and recruit up to 80 local villagers as laborers.
Most mining infrastructure is in place, he said, adding that the locations of planned shafts have been marked. The explosives license is expected by the end of next month, he said.
As for the dynamite, Sharma said the company would begin purchasing 2,000 kg from a local supplier.
