Reserves & Resources

Hochschild Mining plc reports its mineral resources and reserves estimates in accordance with the Australasian Code for Reporting of Exploration Results, Mineral Resources and Ore Reserves 2004 edition. Hochschild Mining Group companies are subject to a comprehensive programme of audits which aim to provide assurance in respect of ore reserve and mineral resource estimates.

The JORC Code requires the use of reasonable economic assumptions, including long-term commodity price forecasts. For the report dated 31 December 2009, the Group assumed a long-term price of US$810 per ounce for gold and US$13.50 per ounce for silver.

Ore reserve estimates are dynamic and are influenced by changing economic conditions, technical issues, environmental regulations and any other relevant new information and therefore these can vary from year to year. Mineral resource estimates can also change and tend to be influenced mostly by new information pertaining to the understanding of the deposit and secondly the conversion to ore reserves.