And just like that, the 2026 Diggers & Dealers Mining Forum came to a close. The coffee and freshly squeezed fruit stands were packed up and company booths dismantled.
Delegates got a few hours to dust themselves off the past three nights’ exhaustion and spruce up for the WesTrac Gala Dinner. More on that in a little while.
Day 3 is always like Forrest Gump’s box of chocolates – you never know what you’re gonna get from a final day program.
PLS managing director Dale Henderson highlighted how much cash the world’s third-largest lithium producer was generating. Talk about a boom-bust story owing to its exposure to just one commodity. Only Fortescue Metals Group can match the rollercoaster ride.
Speaking of lithium, emerging player Global Lithium had a good Diggers & Dealers. Kicking off with an investor site visit to its Manna project east of Kalgoorlie on Sunday, Global Lithium then followed up with news on Tuesday that its all-important Mining Development and Closure Proposal had secured sign-off from the Department of Mines, Petroleum and Exploration.
Global Lithium has struck a deal to buy the still-warm Nova nickel processing plant off IGO and convert it to treat Manna spodumene.
It doesn’t seem like that many years ago that Mark Bennett, then-boss of then-Sirius Resources, ran around Diggers & Dealers with a briefcase full of Nova core to share the most exciting mineral discovery of the 2010s. The discovery was so hot off the press that Sirius could not get a presenting slot.
Back to the present and Genesis Minerals CEO Matthew Nixon titled his presentation yesterday “Genesis and Vault to Merge”.
The merger is old news – even if Vault’s wannabe suitor, Regis Resources boss Jim Beyer, two hours later reminded delegates he was “disappointed, of course” to miss out – but it was the only real M&A news on the agenda at Diggers & Dealers.
And that was perhaps one of the themes of this year’s conference – there were no deals or anticipated deals and no great exploration excitement to get in a lather about.
Producers such as Genesis, Northern Star Resources and Catalyst Metals talked up their hub-and-spoke strategies, which will no doubt drive future corporate activity as near-by gold deposits are collected and consolidated.
And the most recent exploration success stories – think the Hemi gold discovery, the WA1 Resources’ Luni niobium asset and St George Mining’s Araxa rare earths-niobium banger – are making their way through mine development study phases so are relatively quiet from a markets newsflow point of view.
Lots of emerging players talked about the camp-scale potential of their early stage exploration successes and the certainty that their assets would be developed.
None better than Turaco Gold managing director Justin Tremain, who in his presentation during the final session left no stone of confidence unturned when discussing the Afema project in Cote d’Ivoire.
“You couldn’t ask for a better-located project in West Africa,” he said.
“We are in Cote d’Ivoire, which unquestionable is the best jurisdiction within the region, we are in the best part of that country as well, down in the south. So we are well away from the northern (part of the) country so we have no security risk whatsoever in the south, it’s a very easy place to be operating, and we have the best infrastructure here in Cote d’Ivoire.
“(And) unlike many projects in West Africa, we don’t have any villages to relocate. That saves time and significant capital cost.”
No doubt the villagers are happy, too. Giddy up.
Santana Minerals CEO Damian Spring did just that when he dug into the Melbourne Cup archives to explain how his company was progressing the Bendigo Ophir gold project in Central Otago, New Zealand.
Back in 1983, a horse called Kiwi apparently came from the back of the field to beat all runners.
“What we feel like is that this project is poised, with our permit being granted by the end of this year, to cross that finish line, cross it hard, accelerating past all the others,” Spring said.
With a spring in his step, he played a video clip of Kiwi’s heroics.
The sound of the race commentary stopped quite a few conversations out in the Goldfields Arts Centre forecourt; clearly some delegates, still recovering from listening to Santana chair Peter Cook’s band the night before, thought they had landed at the Kalgoorlie-Boulder Racing Club.
Hats off, too, to Gorilla Gold CEO Charles Hughes for turning up for his address dressed in hi-vis.
In between, WA’s new Mines, Petroleum and Exploration Minister, David Pastorelli, made his debut at Diggers & Dealers and faced mining reporters for the first time. They cut the new Minister some slack though Pastorelli straight-batted any suggestions of a potential gold royalty increase – or a relaxation of WA’s non-uranium ban.
So with the final presentation race – 29Metals – run, it was time to celebrate the latest batch of Diggers & Dealers champions.
And before we even got to the winners, it is worth reminding everyone that Tim and Angela Topham’s Topdrill group raised $521,473 for the Royal Flying Doctor Service at their annual Sunday night shed fundraiser. Talk about making a difference.
So to last night. The big gong, the GJ Stokes Memorial Award named in honour of Diggers & Dealers’ founder, recognises someone who has made a significant and lasting contribution to the mining industry.
This year’s GJ Stokes winner was Amanda Lacaze, the long-serving, just-retired boss of Lynas Rare Earths.
Lacaze was not present to accept the award, which completed the trifecta of Lynas absenteeism from this year’s conference – no presentation and no booth.
Speaking of trifectas and continuing the giddy up theme, the three company awards all went to gold stocks.
The Digger Award went to West African Resources for its development of the Kiaka gold mine in Burkina Faso, under budget and ahead of schedule. Kiaka has been in the news more recently because the Government of Burkina Faso is “negotiating” with West African to take a 25% stake in the project.
The Dealer Award went to Greatland Resources for its growth since 2024 to become a top-3 ASX gold stock, on the back of the acquisitions of the Telfer gold-copper mine and the remaining 70% of the Havieron project, in WA’s Pilbara.
The Emerging Company Award went to Minerals 260, which acquired the Bullabulling gold project near Coolgardie in April last year and has advanced work rapidly to forecast first gold in 2028.
Diggers & Dealers also hands out two important non-mining awards.
The first recognises the important role media plays in covering the sector – including at Diggers & Dealers.
This year’s winner was Tara de Landgrafft, the ABC’s rural and resources reporter for the Goldfields-Esperance region.
As the citation said, “Tara has told the stories of the mining industry and the communities that depend on it with clarity, insight and a genuine connection to the region”.
The conference also recognises the next generation of diggers.
The Ray Finlayson Award for Leadership and Academic Excellence, which recognises an outstanding student from the WA School of Mines and is awarded by the Kalgoorlie School of Mines Scholarship Trust, went to fourth-year mining engineering student Elissa Quinn-Williams.
Like past winners of this award, Quinn-Williams will likely have her pick of employment opportunities. In fact, someone should document where winners of the Ray Finlayson Award have ended up.
And with that, it was over to Dave Hughes to entertain the crowds before the entertainment spilt into the Palace and Exchange hotels, for one final night.
Before we know it, we will be planning for the 2027 rendition of Diggers & Dealers.
