Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Gold Fields operating update for March Q1 2021. All participants are currently in listen only mode. There will be an opportunity to ask questions later during the conference. If you should need assistance during the call, please signal an operator by pressing star then zero. Please note that this call is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Chris Griffith. Please go ahead, sir. Thanks. Hi, good afternoon and good morning, depending, I guess, where you are in the world today. It's with great pleasure that I present my first operational update as the CEO of Gold Fields. However, it is deeply saddening that within my first month in office, we lost one of our colleagues at South Deep Mine in a mining incident. Our heartfelt condolences once again go out to Vumile Mphini's family, friends, and colleagues at South Deep Operation. Tragic events like this serve as a hard reminder of the risks involved in our business and reinvigorate our resolve to achieve zero harm in the workplace. Notwithstanding the impact of COVID-19 during the first quarter, particularly at our Cerro Corona and South Deep operations, group attributable gold equivalent production of 541,000 ounces was largely in line with Q1 last year. The Australian region produced 236,000 ounces, and our mines in Ghana produced 221,000, including our 45% stake in Asanko. Cerro Corona, which was also impacted by unusually high rainfall during the March quarter, produced 46,000 ounces gold equivalent. While the effect of a second wave of COVID-19 in South Africa meant that South Deep's production was slightly lower year-on-year at 60,000 ounces. Group all-in sustaining costs were up by 11% year-on-year in the first quarter at $1,078 per ounce. All-in costs were $1,249 per ounce. That was 18% higher year-on-year. As we'd forecasted and as we'd guided, the capital expenditure at Salares Norte begins to ramp up this year. The balance sheet remains in a strong position. Net debt was $1.224 billion at the end of the quarter, compared to $1.069 billion three months prior, with the increase primarily driven by the payment of the final dividend of $190 million. Net debt to EBITDA at the end of the quarter was 0.59 times, largely unchanged from the end of December 2020. Our key growth project, Salares Norte, maintained its positive momentum and continued to track ahead of project schedule during the first quarter. Encouragingly, the detailed engineering was complete in January, and pre-stripping of the Brecha Principal Pit started on the 6th of January this year. The volumes of the pre-stripping continue to track ahead of schedule, with eight million tons moved at the end of March, compared to a planned 1.35 million tons. All other key activities continue to advance largely in line with plan. As you would've seen from the announcement yesterday, the board has given the green light for the construction of a 40 MW solar plant at South Deep in South Africa. This follows the granting of the license by NERSA on the 25th of February. The plant will comprise 116,000 solar panels and generate over 20% of the average electricity consumption of the mine, saving around ZAR 120 million in electricity costs per year. Importantly, it'll reduce our carbon footprint by around 100,000 tons of CO2 a year and contribute to Gold Fields' long-term commitment to carbon neutrality. Construction of the plant will begin during the second quarter, so this quarter, with commissioning planned for Q2 2022. The estimated capital investment for the plant is ZAR 660 million, which will be funded from internal cash flows generated by South Deep. In addition to the South Deep solar project, development at the Huni Pit at Damang was approved post the quarter end at a total capital cost of $43 million, of which $15 million will be incurred during 2021. This will add incremental production to the project and provide flexibility on the mining front. Despite this additional CapEx, we maintain our guidance provided in February 2021. As a reminder, attributable gold equivalent production is expected to be between 2.3 and 2.35 million ounces. all-in sustaining costs is expected to be between $1,020 an ounce and $1,060 an ounce, with all-in costs expected to be $1,310 an ounce to $1,350 per ounce. Finally, just some of my initial observations from being in Gold Fields for the past five weeks. Firstly, the deliberate strategy of moving away from labor-intensive conventional mining to focus on mechanized open pit and underground operations with a majority international exposure has served the company well. The reinvestment program over the past four years has placed Gold Fields in a position where it can maintain and even grow its production profile over the next decade. Salares Norte is indeed a world-class project, and delivering the project on time and on budget is one of the key focus areas in the coming years. Gold Fields' work on ESG issues compares well in the mining space, and we remain on track to provide more definitive targets in our key ESG priorities by the year-end. With that, I'll turn over the call to Q&A. Both myself, Paul Schmidt, the CFO, and also Avishkar is on the line from investor relations. Thanks very much. Over to you. Ladies and gentlemen, at this stage, if you would like to ask a question, please press star and then one now. If you decide to withdraw the question, please press star and then two. Again, if you would like to ask a question, please press star and then one. The first question we have is from Shanu Modi from UBS. Good afternoon, everyone. Chris Griffith, congrats on your appointment. A couple of questions from my side. What would you say is going to be your focus areas for the next 12 months? Where would you like to see the portfolio in, say, five years' time? I've got another two questions after that. Okay. Thanks, Shanu. The focus areas for the next 12 months, firstly, in the next couple of months is really to get a very deep understanding of the business. There's always opportunities in the business to look for productivity and other value-enhancing opportunities. I'll continue to do that. Clearly, the safety journey at South Deep is not complete. There's quite a bit of work to do there. I think a deeper understanding of the assets and their individual strategies. How much further can we push each of these assets? What are their life of mines likely to be? Because there's one thing about the resource and reserve in the way that we declare it, but obviously, because they're underground operations, as we keep drilling, we keep getting life. Which of those operations will have ongoing life to the 10-year period and beyond and which won't? Understanding the strategies and looking about how we can optimize those strategies for each of the assets. I guess that's my priority for the first 12 months. At the same time, being a new CEO gives an opportunity to take a look at the portfolio and have a look at the jurisdictions we're operating in, the assets we're operating in, and then also potentially look for other opportunities outside that. It's really too early for me to say what I think will come out of that. I guess that's going to be the work that myself and the executive team ourselves love to do. I guess that's really going to give us an indication of what the next five years look like. Are we still going to be in the same jurisdictions we're going to be in now? Are we going to be in other jurisdictions? Are there other assets that we want to add to our portfolio? Is there any merit in joining forces with any other companies? All of those things it'll come out in the wash. The main focus that I guess Gold Fields has had over the last number of years, we're not going to radically change that. For example, the focus on quality assets, the focus on highly productive first-class assets that are mechanized and safer, that being jurisdictions that are fairly easy to operate in. That kind of focus and the deliberate focus on value as opposed to just volume. Nothing's going to change. That was my mantra in Anglo Plat, and I think Nick Holland and the management team in Gold Fields have done a good job of really making sure the company focuses on delivering value and not volume. That'll certainly be at the core of the things that I'm looking at. Okay, thanks. That's quite helpful. Just a follow-up to that. You mentioned productivity might be one of the things you'll be looking at. Would you implement something similar to the Anglo American P101 type of strategy there? My second question that I was going to ask anyway was, in the last year, we've seen a lot of unit cost inflation come through in the business. If you look at the quarter-on-quarter and year-on-year numbers, can you give us an idea of how much of that is from external factors, so like FX and fuel, versus inflationary factors, so equipment, salaries, and stuff like that? How much do you think you can offset in the next few years from productivity? Okay, Shanu, I'll comment, and then, Paul, feel free to jump in after me. I think Gold Fields, while they haven't called their focus P101 or something like that, they certainly have an increasing focus over the last couple of years of technology, digitalization, and developing the mine of the future. Certainly as the portfolio, of course, has moved to a much more productive portfolio, that's where the kind of focus has been. It's not as if I think I have to come into the group and start introducing themes like productivity improvements around technology and digital. I'll seek to build on whatever's been in place, and there's some fantastic work that's already underway right across our portfolio. There's always opportunities for productivity improvements. If you start with the fact that there's always opportunities, and as you sort of put one set of initiatives in place, what that does is open up new opportunities. That focus around always looking for productivity improvements is certainly one of the things that I've always carried with me. Some of the things that is already in place, and I don't need to introduce that kind of thinking into the group. What I need to do is work with the group to see how we can really implement that kind of technology, new technologies in certain areas, and around technology and digitalization to really make productivity improvements. I think there's some of that. Whether we ultimately sort of call it something like what Anglo American has been doing around P101, I guess time will tell. The underlying essence of productivity improvements is already in place in Gold Fields, and I'll seek to build on that. I think one of the things that I'll just make up front is, the Gold Fields unit cost in the first quarter was well-guided, that we're likely to see an increase in both all-in sustaining costs and costs this year. It's not just like it's a runaway inflation that's catching us. There was actually deliberate, number 1, there was always planned to be an increase in sustaining capital. A number of our mines are moving away from sort of largely focused on open pit to more underground operations. We expected to see a unit cost increase. Some of the other things that we're having to do, including paste fill in some of our Australian operations. I think it was well flagged and it was well planned that there was going to be an increase in unit costs. I think as we start seeing some of the volume coming through from that work, you're likely to see some of that unit cost being pared back. It was more around a planned increase in a number of those areas than just runaway inflation. Paul, do you want to comment on that? Perhaps, I mean, you've got a much better feel for that. Yeah. Yeah, sure. I think when we gave the guidance in February, we're going deeper at Granny Smith, the need for more paste fill. Chris has spoken about that. At Damang, remember now, a lot of the capital is moved out of capital waste stripping into operational waste stripping. I think the one thing you did allude to is, the exchange rate has hurt us on conversion. When we guided and sort of the average for last year for South Africa was 17.50. The first quarter, we ended up an exchange rate of below 15. That does have quite a significant impact when you convert into dollars. We've also seen the strengthening of the Aussie dollar. Alone, quarter-on-quarter, in South Africa, we were probably seeing about ZAR 40 million-ZAR 50 million worth of just exchange rate increases coming from converting at the stronger exchange rate. Yeah, Chris is right. We guided a lot of it. It's not rampant inflation at all. It's to a large degree, the changing of the mining mix. As we go deeper into some oz as well, we're moving now away from the open pits to mainly underground. It is almost always more expensive mining. I hope that answers your question. No, that's very helpful. Thanks, guys. Just the last question. In terms of your guidance, you haven't changed anything from February, but you're already talking about higher CapEx for Damang and at South Deep. You're also talking about production risks at South Deep and Cerro Corona because of COVID. In your guidance, you've got ZAR 15.50 and AUD 0.75 per US dollar, both of which have gone against you. How do we reconcile the numbers so that we can get back to your guidance for the rest of the year? You want me to talk to it? Yeah, go for it, Paul. If you think I'll do it. We always give a wide range when we give it for the group share. We go a little bit lower on where we see the number a little bit higher, and we're tending to the top end of our guidance. As we'd alluded, there's some extra ounces potentially coming from Corona. When we convert the copper into gold, with copper running rampant, you're getting far more equivalent ounces. When we check the guidance, we use the new exchange rate, but we're still comfortable. Production, no issue. In terms of the all-in sustaining cost, we're still sitting probably just in the middle of the guidance, but in all-in costs, we're right at the top end of the range at the moment. It's just the way we guide. We do give ourselves a bit of headroom when we give guidance at the beginning of the year. Okay, thanks. No, thanks, guys. Very helpful. I think there's one or two areas. Perhaps just a final comment on that. There's one or two areas where we're doing a little bit better than we planned, is making up for some of the areas where we're doing a bit worse than planned. The other thing is, Shanu, I think the important thing is that there are some areas that we've told you, okay, it's based on these assumptions. Of course, if some of those assumptions change materially, then that will have an impact on the guidance. For example, at South Deep, we did have a fairly material impact in the first quarter for COVID. We have said that we haven't planned any further disruptions going forward. We still think that South Deep is going to have a much better year-on-year improvement, and that'll be the case. The fact is, if there's a massive third wave in South Africa, then it's going to affect both operations in Peru, of course, as we go through a third wave. If we have a massive third wave here in South Africa, yeah, it's going to affect South Deep's operations. It's based on those sort of common assumptions, plus we're doing a little bit better in some areas and making up a bit in other areas in addition to what Paul said. Have you seen any COVID impact in Chile by any chance, just in terms of the construction effort there for Salares Norte? The answer is yes. We got off to a really good start. We had a little bit of cushion. We're eating a little bit into some of that cushion. The team have been able to really come up with some innovative ways to be able to manage this. For example, they very quickly built additional accommodation that cost us some money. But it meant that we could manage the COVID-19 situation a bit better. We've brought in some additional staff to be able to manage that. We've done a couple of things that's cost us a bit of money, but I think the team have really had a fantastic outcome. Of course, in Chile. Of course, the vaccination program in Chile is really fantastic. Whilst we have still seen sort of third wave infection rates, we've seen much lower death rates in Chile as a result of the COVID-19 vaccination program. Yeah, some impact. It's eating a little bit into some of the fats we had, but at the moment we're still ahead of schedule. Shanu, can I just add one other thing? We're getting kind of a double positive in Peru. Remember when we calculated the all-in costs on the equivalent basis, we used the by-product credit. We're getting more ounces in terms of equivalent, but we're also getting that massive credit that's coming through on the copper sales. That means that in terms of what we guided for Cerro Corona, we are way down on the all-in and all-in sustaining costs, and that runs through to the group numbers as well. That's where you're seeing some of the offset coming, offsetting the higher costs at South Deep, et cetera. Perfect. Thanks very much, guys. Thank you. The next question we have is from Jared Hoover from RMB Morgan Stanley. Afternoon, guys. Thanks for the call. Can you guys hear me clearly? I can hear you fine, Jared. Perfect. I have a few questions, and I think Shanu covered some of them to a certain degree. Maybe let me just ask my first one around strategy, and then I'll follow up with the other two or three. I think as I mentioned, I think you've answered this to a degree, Chris, but are you able to share any of your preliminary thoughts on where you see potentially underappreciated pockets of value in Gold Fields that you might want to bring to the fore in the future, and that might help with this valuation discount that we see at Gold Fields relative to your international peers? Maybe aligned to that, whether you see any areas where that might require additional executive time going forward. I'll let you guys answer that and I'll follow up with one or two more. Okay. I'll go and then both Avi and Paul feel free to add. Look, I mean, the one thing about being five weeks into a new organization is that I think it's a pretty good position to start from, that you still know very little. There's two particular areas that I think that we are not yet getting value for in our valuation of the company, in our share price. The one is clearly around Salares Norte, and I think it's just an expectation that'll flow through when the cash starts flowing. Yes, it is in some of the valuation models. It really only starts delivering the kind of value to the share price once the project is delivered. There's always concern that projects will be late, that they'll overrun in costs, and that they won't deliver what management has said. I think the only way we can deal with that is to deliver the project on time and within budget. I think we've demonstrated we're nicely on track to do that. I think you'll really see some of that benefit coming through when we deliver the project. That's the first one in my view. The second one in my view is I still don't think that we get the value for the life that is actually in the Australian assets. Clearly you've got to work with the resource and the reserves that we give you. The reality is that we've had the same resource and reserve in Australian assets for the last eight years or something, and we've probably got more resource and reserve now than when we bought them. We have mined for eight years. I think those are two particular areas that I don't think is and perhaps the third one is South Deep. Clearly there's been a lot of disappointment around South Deep, and I still myself need to really understand South Deep well. Where the direction of travel is going on South Deep and the potential that we have, if we can do what we say we're going to do, then I think there's still quite a bit of value in our share price that is not yet ascribed to South Deep. I don't know. Avi and Paul, do you guys want to add anything to that? Contradict me if you feel like it. Valuable from me. Nope. I think those were the three I would have highlighted, too. Nope. Thanks, guys. Okay. Yeah. Thanks, Jared. Great. Thanks, Chris. I know it's still early days, so you wouldn't say there's any areas of the business that potentially might need beefing up then or potentially introduction of traditional personnel or so? No. I think generally, from what I've seen, clearly I haven't been able to visit the operation, so I've done sort of virtual site visits. That's not such an easy thing to do to get a deep understanding of the quality of people. I've done already a set of virtual site visits around, myself, Paul, Avi, and the executives have done a round of quarterly production reviews. I'm starting to get a feel for what people are. Generally, I think we've got a good team in Gold Fields at pretty much all of the regions. Time will tell whether there's one or two small changes we want to make. No, I don't think that there's a massive problem in any of the jurisdictions that we operate in. Rather, let me say that again. I think we've actually got good teams in place. Generally, the operations are doing well there. Perfect. Thanks, Chris. Just to follow up, I had one or two questions just on the operations. Your release did mention that the Huni Pit at Damang has been approved. Really two sort of sub-questions in this regard. The first is whether this is an element mine planning in the current gold price environment, or is this intended to give Damang a greater life of mine runway that allows you time to optimize any cutback that might come through in the next year or two at this particular asset? I'll comment, but happy to let you follow, Paul. My view of number one is no, we are not using high gold prices now to justify projects, because actually what that does is you start incentivizing higher cost assets, and all you do is you chase yourself up a cost curve. The one thing that I was very pleased to see was in place at Gold Fields, is that long-term gold prices are used to motivate projects, and if they can't fly at the long-term prices, then they don't fly. We're not chasing up projects now that might be profitable for a year or two, and thereafter they're not if the gold price changes. Longer-term gold prices are used, and that makes sure that we are disciplined around how we spend capital and how we chase value. That'll be my first observation, I was very pleased to see that discipline in place when I got to Gold Fields. The second thing is that, of course, we're always looking at the assets as to what projects add value. The big Damang cutback, which is in execution now, was, I think, well executed. As that is being executed, this mini-cutback at Huni Pit, that has been on the radar for quite a long time, but was in the greater scheme of things, not the project that we wanted to chase in the Damang cutback. There was also some work to do to make sure that it met the hurdle rates, the various internal hurdle rates that are in place. That work was done, eventually, a team could come and convince management that it was a project worthwhile investing in. That's why it's been approved. Paul, I don't know if you want to add anything to that. Yeah, I think the other thing is we get economies of scale. Huni on its own makes a fair amount of money. Once we start splitting the cost between Huni and the main pit, and you look at Huni and the main pit together, you actually get a lot of value accretion in terms of NPV, et cetera. That's what it made it attractive to us when we approved it earlier this week. Okay, great. Thank you for that. Then just my last, well, my second last question now on South Deep, and maybe more of a clarification than a question, but I know the productivity metrics have generally been trending in the right direction for a good few quarters now, but would it also be reasonable for me to assume that if that is the case, then we should be seeing a greater proportion of underground material coming from the North of Wrench area versus the old mine? In that case, the grade should be ticking up, because at the moment it looks like the grade has been coming back over the last six months or so. Just some color there, please, if you don't mind. I think, so the answer is yes, and I'm very happy here to get help from my colleagues. The answer is yes. I mean, even in this quarter, we saw greater underground production. We actually saw less surface production. What we did see is there was one particular higher grade area that we couldn't mine in this quarter, which is why some of the grades fell. Under normal conditions, that's exactly what you should see. You should see us with many of these underlying metrics. If you have a look at the de-stress meters were up, the development was up, underground mining was up. All of those things are the right metrics to look at because they show that the right inputs are in place, and ultimately, that'll flow through to increased underground production. My view is that many of those underlying metrics are trending in the right direction. You saw the underground tons mined were up or grade areas that would have sort of balanced out the underground grade. Yeah, I think the underlying metrics are certainly pointing, from what I can see, in the right direction. Paul, Avi, you guys want to add anything to that? I mean, you need to be looking at the underground grade. I mean, last quarter it was 6.3, this quarter it was 5.6. As Chris alluded, there was one stope that we weren't able to take out. We've always said the underground is somewhere around six grams a ton. I don't think there's anything to be worried about. It's also depending on which stopes you're taking at any given time. I don't think we've seen a general decrease in the underground rate. We had a very good rate, grade in the December quarter. Okay, great. Thanks. Just my last question on Cerro Corona. I think the commentary in the release alluded to the removal of the waste taking about three years now. I think at the back end of last year, you guys got it to about two years. Should I be thinking of your guidance as on the conservative end, or should we be thinking that you probably are expecting a ramp-up in COVID-19 cases in the country and that might impact the plan around waste stripping at Cerro Corona? No. Thanks. We did guide quite specifically last year that we were about 9 million tons behind and we would do 3 million tons a year for the next three years. That was the guidance we gave in February. Nothing's changed. That's what we intend to still do. Okay, great. Thanks, guys. That's all for me. Thank you. The next question we have is from Tanya Jakusconek from Scotiabank. Yes. Good afternoon, gentlemen. Chris, congratulations on your new role. I have two questions. I'm going to start with the easier one, which are just on the technical side. Just a little bit of clarity on Damang, on this new pit. I just want to understand how this fits in the new mine plan. Is this incremental ore, or is this ore that's being moved forward? Is it already in the mine plan? Was it already in the mine plan? Paul, the way I understand it is that already in the mine plan, bring that material forward. I think that's correct. It was to utilize the synergies on the cost, as I alluded to earlier. I think it was originally planned for 2023, if I'm correct. Yeah, we brought it forward. Okay. This is going to then be processed, if it was in 2023, you're going to be processing it one year earlier? Yeah. I think what it does is it ensures continuity over the next few years so that you don't have sort of up and downs in the productivity as you're stripping. That particular area, whilst it was in the mine plan, still needed to show financial viability. That's been done. We've now brought that forward. What it means is what we have ensured is greater consistency of mining at Damang for the next few years. We're unlikely to see additional volume over the next few years, but you are likely to see less volatility in the production over those last few years of the life of mine. Okay. Thanks for that. Just on that Cerro Corona, I just wanted to understand. You've reduced your guidance by 20,000 ounces. I'm not quite sure what the impact for that reduction was. You mentioned COVID. I saw that there was also some metallurgy. Your recovery was down. What actually happened to reduce that guidance? A combination of COVID. COVID had a very material impact on Cerro Corona in the first three months. We also had unusually high rainfall in the first quarter. In the areas that we were mining, we had areas that had lower grade and higher metallurgy issues in the plant. The combination of all of those meant that we were stripping, perhaps not as fast as we would have liked to have stripped, compared to the extra 3 million tons, but we were stripping on the other side of the mine as opposed to being able to get into the ore. That is still going to impact us for pretty much for the rest of the year, as some of that impact means that we haven't opened up as much ore as we needed to. If we want to continue for the long term, making sure we're sustainable in the mine, we're going to have to continue doing the waste. We won't be able to chase quickly and go get the ore. Also, we don't want to run the mine for a three or six-month window. A combination of COVID-19, a combination of high rainfall in the areas that we're mining, and the catch-up of the waste has meant that we sort of look through this year. We think that we're going to mine about 20,000 gold ounces less, but we're going to be overall square because we're still going to get the copper in the areas that we're mining and the copper price is going to help out there. What we are going to see is a slightly lower production than we had expected in Cerro Corona this year. Okay. Thanks for that. It was the waste portion of it that you have to move to another area that I didn't appreciate. Maybe then from an overall guidance for the year, is there anything quarterly that we should be looking at? Like you alluded, the higher capital in Q1. As we look at Q2, 3, 4, are you expecting a stronger second half? Is there any variability in your mines and your capital that we should be aware of? Paul, do you want to comment on that? I mean, without doubt, we're going to have a catch-up in capital. We've guided to the capital numbers, and if you sort of spread that over the next three quarters, you're going to see that without doubt, we're going to ramp up materially in capital spend. I mean, the big thing, Tanya, you can work on, I mean, we guided $500 million capital alone for Salares. We only spent about $50 million this quarter at Salares. There's going to be a big ramp-up in Salares spend as we get into the real nitty-gritty of everything. I mean, we still take guidance, and you can work all-in costs. We were only $1,249, and we're guiding $1,310-$1,350. There will be a lot of growth capital coming through in second, third, and fourth quarters of the year. Remember, we've always said, quarter one, we never spend the capital we think we do, and it generally gets carried over to quarter two, three, and four. This is in terms of this plan. You will see a pickup in the next week. Yeah. I was alluding more to the production profile and sustaining capital. I'm sorry. Perhaps just a other comment. I mean, you see, to get to our production numbers, we will have to have better second, third, and fourth quarter numbers. That's actually traditionally what you see anyway. I mean, our slowest quarter is always the first quarter. You'll see a pickup as we generally gain momentum through the year. We have better second and fourth quarters in production. Going with that, we are going to see a catch-up in the Well, not a catch-up, according to the plan, we sort of spend less in the first quarter. As Paul says, as we get more places to work on the project, the spend ramps up accordingly. I think all round it's as we planned. We are going to increase our production second, third, and fourth quarters. The only big thing that we can see on the horizon that could impact that is if we have big coronavirus waves in Peru and in South Africa. Other than that, it'll be production ramp up second, third, fourth quarter and CapEx ramp up second, third, and fourth quarter. Okay. Just a couple of final ones. I just wanted to look at, there is inflationary pressures going through cost structures of a lot of companies. They're seeing increases in copper, steel prices, concrete, freight, et cetera. I'd like to understand, in your cost structure, what inflation pressures are you seeing, and especially on your labor side and your wage negotiations in South Africa. Paul, I'll talk about labor in both Australia and South Africa, and then you can come in behind me on other mining inflation-related pressure. We are seeing two particular areas that have got, I think, extra pressure on around labor. One is we're going into wage negotiations in South Africa at South Deep. That from halfway through the year, we need to have settled. We don't think that there's any undue pressure or any undue expectations. In South Africa, wages generally settle at 1% or 2% above inflation. With sort of 40% of our costs in South Africa being wages, you can see that that will have an impact on the mining inflation being above inflation. That's all been part factored into our all-in costs, and that's not anything unusual. Again, we'll be seeking to try get a longer-term settlement, the way we did the last time, to be able to give us stability at the operation for the next few years. Whilst that is happening, that's not unusual, and it's been factored into our costs. I think the one particular area that is sort of ahead of our expectations around pressure on costs is in Australia, and particularly with just the sort of booming commodities all around. Iron ore, lithium, gold, coal. It's putting massive pressure on labor and being able to make sure we can have labor stability. We've had to increase some allowances to keep our staff in Australia because we're seeing massive turnovers in the beginning of the year. The Australian team, under Stuart's leadership, have been able to cut that back. We're seeing much lower labor turnover. That is going to have some upward pressure on costs in Australia. You want to add anything to that, Paul? Tanya, obviously we're seeing a pickup in copper price. We're starting to see it, but it hasn't had a major impact. Obviously, a lot of it's going to be used in the construction at Salares Norte. Remember, we've got a lot of fixed contracts in place there. We've also got the hedge in place that is really being very positive at the moment to us. That's offsetting a lot of the increases we are seeing. At the moment, as Chris said, our guidance incorporates these increases, but we'll have to watch it. It depends how copper and our hard iron ore goes for the balance of this year. Okay, great. Finally, Chris, I wanted to ask for your view on South Deep. I'm just interested, because that mine, as you've mentioned, has had a challenging past, and productivity is well below world standards for this type of an asset. Could you maybe share your thoughts on how you're optimistic in terms of unlocking value at this asset? Can you share your thoughts on what you need to do to unlock the value? Is it productivity? Is it getting to that larger portion of the ore body to implement the mechanized mining? What is it that you need to see to unlock this value? Tanya, look, I say this all with a big health warning because I've only been in the office for five weeks. I have already had, I don't know, three presentations from the mine. First of all was just to understand the history and how the mining method has evolved, sort of from the very first time they got into the ore body. Sort of as I've gone through that, one thing that I just generally get a feel is that we've got a much better handle on how to mine the ore body. The health warning I give is that I don't think and I don't want to say yet there'll never be amendments to the ore body or to the mining method. Sorry, I've just had a dog sit on top of my computer. Sorry about that. Probably a cute dog. When a 65 kg Great Pyrenees sits on your computer, you've got to stop and fix that first. Sorry about that. That's okay. Tanya, I think the first observation that I have is the evolution of the mining method looks to me to be constructive. I think the team have got a much better handle on sort of mining direction, how to take the mining direction to have better management of seismicity, the way that they mine the de-stress, the cuts that they're taking in the de-stress. All of those actually, from a mining engineer's point of view, look like a lot of evolution from blood, sweat, and tears has gone into that mining method. It looks to me that they've got a handle on it. The mine is starting to look like a mine to me. It's got structure. You can see where people are mining. I sort of went back to some of the old plans, and we were all over the place. I think we're moving away from some of the older mining areas into having much more of our mining in the new roads. I think some of that underlying metrics are now starting to show some positive direction. If I look at the sort of just the team are much more focused on just having a sequence and not chasing today's production. When you do that, you just get yourself into a muddle everywhere. What they're doing is they're having the sequences mined properly, and that's why you're seeing the increase in square meters, you're seeing the increase in development. You're also seeing the productivities. I went back just a year ago, we were getting 35 meters per rig. Some of those are up now at 80 meters a rig. They've still got to go. Generally, I haven't formed an opinion yet, so I'm listening and looking. I've only been underground once. Of course, this is a very difficult time to go there and kick the tires with the guys and get a feel for are the right things happening. Overall, I'm more positive than I expected to be, and also some of the direction of travel of the underlying My philosophy around mining is that if you do the right things long enough, you absolutely must be successful. It seems to me that- they're doing the right things and they're sticking to their guns. I think they've evolved into a better mining method. It doesn't help doing the wrong things long enough. I know that's been a long answer, but I'm generally more positive than I expected to be. I think it's too early to make a final commitment as to what I think of the asset. Overall, I think the guys are doing a great job. I think Martin and the leadership team got in place. They've stabilized the leadership team. They've got good quality people. Even the way they rate the hires, every time they rate the hires, the new recruits, they're comparing them on quality to what has left. I think in about 17 or 18 of the recruits, they were telling me yesterday, they can absolutely positively say that I think 16 of the 18 recruits were all improvement in quality on what they had before. There's lots of different sort of touch points, Tanya, that give me a feel for actually there's some positive momentum. Again, there's a health warning there. It's a bit early for me to have a firm opinion yet. Okay. Well, thank you so much, Chris, for your insight. I really look forward to seeing how South Deep develops. It's been a long time, and it will be great to see this mine work. Thanks. Thanks very much. Thank you. The next question we have is from Nina Dergunova from Goldman Sachs. Good afternoon, gentlemen. Thank you very much for the presentation, and congratulations to Chris on the new role. Most of my questions have been answered already, but I have several remaining, and will ask one by one. The first one, Chris, you outlined three areas which don't get value in the company's share price. You spoke already about the past unlock value on Salares Norte, on South Deep. What are your plans to crystallize value to the market on the remaining one, the Australian reserves expansion? Yeah. This is something that we're thinking about. Avi, myself, and Paul have been thinking about how we try give a sense of the potential of those assets, so that when you're putting in your model, you're not putting in three or four years in your model and thereafter, because it looks like the resource and reserve run out. We've got to find a way to try and help people see what the long-term value for those assets are. I think it's a little bit too soon, and it's a question on our minds, and we're trying to come up with how we think we can sell that story better to the market. Avi, do you want to add anything to that? No. We had a plan last year, and that never happened. I think at the appropriate time, we'll do that again and try and demonstrate what we're doing in the region to further unlock reserve and also convert resource to reserve and grow both of those as well. It'll only happen in time. Yeah, there's a plan that we need to work on and then articulate to the market. I think it's also fair to say that Nick's been trying to do that for a long time when he was showing the fact that we've grown the resource base over the last eight years or so, 8-10 years. The fact is we've still got the same resource base, notwithstanding all the mining. I think we've just got to find. I know Nick has been trying, and we've got to see how else we can try and get that value, people to see the longer-term value of what is in the ground there. I think the answer is we're working on it. Very great. Thank you. That is clear. The second question is on the solar plant in South Deep. Can you discuss if you can undertake another project of that kind in SA to increase self-generated power further from the 20% that you guide by current project? The second part of this question, in what other operations similar projects can be undertaken and when we could hear on the decision on this? Sorry, Nina, I missed your first part of the question. Could you repeat that for me, please? Yes, sure. The first part was on the solar plant in South Deep. Yes. Can you discuss if you can undertake another project of the same kind in South Africa to increase self-generated power further? You guided for 20% self-sufficiency in the current project. Can you make more projects of that kind in SA? Thank you. The first question is, I think we first got to go, build. This is going to be the biggest solar plant as far as my knowledge goes, certainly anywhere in the mining industry in South Africa. This is 120,000 solar panels that we're going to put in. This is a massive plant. It's certainly bigger than anything. I'll come to your second part of your question and tell you where else we've built plants, but it's certainly much, much bigger than anything we've done before. Once we've built the plant and once we're starting to save all of this money and we've proved that it I mean, it's quite a simple concept, so we don't have a doubt that we'll get the savings. I think we must first go and build that, develop the project and get the savings. I think we can look at going back, first of all to the management team will have to come back to the executive to show that that's still the best place for the company to spend capital. I think once you've developed that, there's no stopping us. I mean, clearly there'll be regulatory approval that we'll have to go to again. I think once you've demonstrated the principle, there's no reason to believe why we couldn't do more. At this point in time, we'd also have to couple that with probably some storage capacity, some battery, because then we'll be going over our base load power, and that means anything that we generate at a particular point in time could be excess. So we'd have to be able to store it and it would make it much more expensive. There's some thoughts about that, at the moment, I mean, we're just incredibly pleased that we've been able to get through the regulatory hurdles, been able to get the approvals and now get board approval to go and build this. This is gonna be a big game changer for Gold Fields, a big game changer in being a big game changer for South Deep. When we save 100,000 tons per year of CO2, that's gonna be a positive story on so many fronts. At the same time, not Gold Fields first foray into renewables. As you probably know, we've already built at Granny Smith and at Agnew in Australia. We have built a combination of renewable plants there. For example, at Granny Smith, we have converted 24 megs of diesel to gas power, much lower carbon intensity. We've got a 8 MW solar plant there. Also some batteries. There we're saving, that's about 10% of our electricity is coming from solar. I think the really positive story comes from Agnew in Australia, because the combination of 18 MW of gas, 4 MW of solar and 18 MW of wind, the combination meant that 67% of electricity of that mine is now coming from renewables. It's a fantastic story. We've already got two. We've got one mine in Australia that's under construction, will be complete by the end of the year at Gruyere. That's our 12 MW solar plant. Also an additional 4.4 MW of gas generation. You can see that this is a journey that the company's on, a very successful journey, some fantastic runs on the board. Fantastic mines that have already been converted or not converted, but at a substantial portion of their power generated by renewables. Now is gonna come South Deep, the next questions for us that we've got studies underway is what happens at St. Ives in Australia, Salares Norte in Chile. All across the group, ultimately every operation will have renewables to some extent. The extent to that we can push those renewables as a total percentage of the mine's power, that'll be determined, of course, by both the success of the project and the funding of future projects. Thank you. Thank you very much for detailed reply. Sounds great along on the beneficial journey for the company. The last question is very detailed from my side. Can you speak a bit more about Granny Smith's performance in the first Q? Production was down about 15% from the previous quarter. What's the path from here? Can you discuss what happened in the first Q and how production can recover in next quarters? Okay. I don't know, Paul, do you wanna have a crack at that first and then I'll follow if there's anything else there? Okay. I'm not sure if Paul's still on or if he's on mute. Oh, sorry. I'm on. I think they had some mining issues in the first quarter, but they anticipate to make it up by the rest of the year. That's all the production is down. Yes. Mostly guidance. Mainly in guidance is concerned. Okay, that's helpful. Thanks a lot. That's it from my side. We'll pass words to other analysts. Thank you. Thank you. The next question we have is from Ed Stoddard from Business Maverick. Yeah. Hi, Chris. Can you hear me? I can hear you, Ed. Great. Yeah, congratulations also on your new position. I'm glad that you're settling in. Look, I just have a question vaguely related to South Deep. South Deep is your only asset here now. The Mining Charter course, the judicial review of the Mining Charter, took place this week. I'm just wondering, how much of an issue is getting this stuff resolved from an investor perspective? I know South Africa is a small part of your global production base now, but are there still investor concerns around South Deep and these kind of Charter issues? I'll comment, and then I'll let Avishkar just, you can feel free to add something to that, Avi. Look, until this issue is resolved in South Africa, it's still gonna have some overhang over South Africa for sure. It's always gonna look like regulatory certainty is a concern. I think, as we have said for many, many years, many different companies, that actually many of us have got 30 years' worth of rights, and many of the companies have still got 20 or 25 years of those rights to go. The fact that Gold Fields has a 35% empowerment, that's been acknowledged by the regulator. This is not an immediate concern issue, well, not for the next 20 years or so. It's not a concern for Gold Fields. I think it's more the overhang for South African mining in general that is a concern. There is, of course, where there's still a lot of concern around this particular once empowered, always empowered matter. It's not so much about the current life because the minister's already acknowledged that the once empowered, always empowered applies for your current duration of your license. I think it's if there's change of control or the asset gets sold to someone else. I think it's under those conditions that having to re-empower operations or re-empower the company, is a major concern to everyone. There's a couple of other niggling issues, but I think generally, Ed, that's the thing. I think overall, still a negative overhang for us. For as long as this thing's not resolved, it has a negative impact on just the mining industry in South Africa. Generally, actually, the Minerals Council and the mining companies in general have made good progress with the minister and the Department of Mineral Resources and Energy over the last couple of years, three, four years or so. We have made much progress. The thing is, actually, it sort of feels much more negative than the general regulatory environment in South Africa actually is. I guess those would be my comments. The quicker this gets resolved, the better. It's not an immediate threat to Gold Fields at all. Avishkar, do you want to add to that? Nope, that's fine. Thanks, Chris. Yeah, no, that's great. That answered my question, Chris. Thank you very much. Thanks, Ed. Thank you. The next question we have is from Adrian Hammond from SBG Securities. Hey, Chris. Yeah, a couple of questions from me. First on South Deep. I appreciate you just only looking at this asset now, but is this something you would prepare to throw cash at to get it right? It is 60% of group reserves. That's a risk to the business. Adrian, I haven't got a sense that we need to throw cash at it. I think over years, the company has invested in South Deep and particularly invested through a number of iterations of mining methods. It doesn't feel to me like it requires any material cash. It does need ongoing sustaining capital, but it doesn't feel like if we just took a big pot of money and threw it at South Deep that that's gonna change things overnight. I don't get a sense that it needs material cash thrown at it. That's my first impression. Is the reserve life a threat to Gold Fields? I wouldn't say so because our focus is not on just dividing the production by the total reserves, and then coming up with a 20-year life of mine for the group. I think what we do is we look at each of the assets and we look at the regions and if we, for example, let's say we sold South Deep, that's not gonna change anything in Ghana. It's not gonna change anything in South America, and it's not gonna change anything in Australia. No, I don't think that that's a threat to the company at all. Optically, it might look a bit different, but it's not a threat to the company, no. Thanks. Perhaps, a cheeky question, if I may, around M&A. Just like to hear you if you prepared a comment on what was said from Sibanye-Stillwater regarding potential consolidation with you and AngloGold. Are you prepared to comment on that? Is that something the board would ever consider, and have you been approached at all? Yes. Adrian, we've seen the comments in the media, but as has long been the discipline of the company, so we don't comment on speculation because it could mean anything. We don't. I think we look at our current investment case. If we don't comment on speculation, we say, "Well, actually, what is there for our own shareholders?" Actually, we think that we've got a really fantastic investment case. It's compelling for our shareholders and also for any investor that's looking for exposure to high-quality and cash-generative gold businesses. There's a number of really good things that are in Gold Fields' favor. It is simple. It is pure play gold. It's got, I think, fantastic geographical diversification in actually really good jurisdictions. It's got high-quality, low-cost operations. If you think about the strategy of the company over a number of years, of moving away from labor-intensive conventional mining to focus on more mechanized open-pit, mechanized underground operations that are safer and more productive, that has stood the company very well over the last number of years. We've got great projects that are in the pipeline. We've got a world-class project that's in the pipeline, that's Salares Norte. It's consuming quite a bit of cash for this year, next year. After that, it's going to start pumping out cash. I think the question is, if any tie-ups are thought about, our shareholders will say, "Is that value accretive, and is that strategy accretive?" I'm not going to comment on those speculations, but I think we've got a great story for our own shareholders. If we think, only one of the very earlier questions is, if there's some negative issues about that, can we do something about that so our shareholders get the full value of Gold Fields? As you've heard from us, those are the things that we're looking at. From our own strategy perspective, we're looking at what next is out there for us internally. Of course, it's always going to be the best value for shareholders is if you're driving value out of the existing business. We'll be looking at what opportunities are available. We will be looking as to whether they are strategy and value accretive to us as we look at our own opportunities. Yeah, I'm going to leave it like that, Adrian. Thanks, Chris. Thank you. The last question we have is from Raj Ray from BMO Capital Markets. Thank you, operator. Good afternoon, Chris and team. Just one quick question from me. With respect to Peru and the noise around the elections currently, we'll see who wins on June 6th. Just wanted to get your thoughts on what you're hearing from the ground in terms of if the risk is related to future investment. Avishkar, do you want to comment on this one? I've got some thoughts and happy to do that, but why don't you go ahead? Yeah, sure. From our team on the ground, there's still a lot of uncertainty with who wins this election. I think one important thing that they're saying is, for him to change or if the leftist, Mr. Castillo, wins, I think if he wants to change the constitution or change laws, I think it takes a lot of effort and a lot of time. I don't think it's something that we're immediately concerned about. I think to change the regulation will require a lot of effort from his side. It's not something we're particularly concerned about now. Also, he needs to go to Congress before he makes any of those big changes. Yeah, nothing sort of imminent, but it's something we're watching closely, of course. Just one comment, Avi, to add to that. Our team on the ground say that he doesn't have that support in the Congress. Whilst he may be saying these things publicly to get elected, it'll be much, much more difficult for him to be able to do this practically because he doesn't have that support in the Congress. Our team are watching it, as Avi says, but not overly concerned at the moment. Okay. Thanks, Chris. Also at Cerro Corona, are there any licenses or permits that are up for renewal immediately, or are they good for the life of the mine? I don't know the answer to that question. Avi or Paul, have you guys got any more insights into that? I'm not aware of any material permits that are requiring renewal at the moment. No, I think it's just the permits that are sort of required for the raises of the dam, the water raises of the TSF. Those are more like admin-related than major approvals. Okay. Thank you very much. That's it for me. Okay. Is that it, guys? That is our final question. Okay. Well, thanks very much to all of you for your time and for your questions. Look forward to engaging with you in future opportunities like this. Thanks very much. Thanks, guys. Cheers. If there are any follow-up questions, please get in touch with myself or Thomas, and we will get back to you as soon as possible. Thank you. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, that then concludes today's conference. Thank you for joining us. You may now disconnect your lines.