Kell
Nielsen has looked at between 80 and 100 mineral projects in the past eight
weeks. That”s how it is in Mongolia these days. Nielsen, who heads Voyager
Resources (VOR), knows the race is on between mining companies to lock up
ground in Mongolia, which might be best described as the Next Big Thing in the
resources world, says a report in The Australian.

Voyager
is not a stock that has commanded all that much interest — or support, for
that matter. But its first pass drilling at the Daltiin Ovor project turned up
some interesting intersections, including 3m at 50.59 grams/ton gold, 4 per
cent copper and 31.3g/t silver, starting just 6m below surface. Nielsen is
planning to do more testing of the high-grade areas, but using a diamond drill
rather than a reverse circulation one. The latter is fine for resource
statements under ASX rules, but the Mongolians require diamond drilling results
when applications are made for licenses.

But
back to those 80-plus projects. Voyager is casting its net widely, excluding
only ferrous metals and coal. Its focus so far has been copper-gold, but it is
looking at base metals projects, too. 
And especially tin, with that metal now coming on to many investor radar
screens. Last year, Nielsen thought he would have a two-year window for picking
up projects in Mongolia, but the land rush has just picked up significantly in recent
months. He”ll be looking to bed down deals as soon as possible.

And
we hear there”s mounting excitement at Aspire Mining (AKM) regarding the
present drilling at its Ovoot coking coal project as the company gets near its
initial JORC resource statement. It has to be big, mainly to justify building a
railway line of about 500km to the remote location — although the economics of
that would be helped if other large deposits en route, including magnetite and
phosphate, were also to be developed.

By
the way, for those who still think of Mongolia as a basket case, the
International Monetary Fund reported this month that the country had witnessed
a dramatic turnaround in the past 18 months. In early 2009, growth had been
stalling, international reserves were rapidly being depleted, there was
insufficient financing to meet the spending needs of the government, and the
banking system was under pressure. The economy was on the verge of collapse.

But
look at Mongolia now, with growth for 2010 expected to come in at 8 per cent
and, as the IMF summed it up, “international reserves are at an all-time
high, public finances are on a sound footing, and the banking system has been
strengthened”.