ASX-listed Kingrose Mining on Wednesday announced an exploration alliance agreement with commodities major BHP, which would provide funding for regional exploration across Norway and Finland.

This follows on from Kingrose’s successful participation in the BHP Xplor programme, which the major developed to address the challenge of declining global discovery rates.

In tterms of the agreements, BHP would sole fund up to $20-million in regional generative exploration over up to four years across belt-scale areas of interest in Norway and Finland for the exclusive right to select targets to become defined projects.

In respect of each defined project, BHP may earn up to 75% in two stages by sole funding a further $36-million over seven years from starting the earn-in phase.

Thereafter, subject to BHP exercising the option to establish a joint venture (JV), the parties shall fund JV activities on a pro-rata basis.

“The terms of these alliances are industry-leading in how they foster collaboration and the opportunity for mutual value creation between a major and junior company,” said Kingrose MD Fabian Baker.

The alliances will see significant exploration expenditure across these mineral belts with the objective of discovering tier-one mineral deposits.

“The exploration tenements held by Kingsrose in Norway and Finland represent a rare exploration opportunity with respect to their scale and prospectivity for discovery,” added Baker.

In Norway, Kingsrose's exploration licences cover a combined strike of over 200 km of prospective greenstone belt geology that is the under explored continuation of the Central Lapland Greenstone (CLGB)  belt in northern Finland. The CLGB is host to significant gold deposits, such as Agnico Eagle’s Kittilä mine and the Ikkari deposit recently discovered by Rupert Resources, as well as Europe’s largest nickel/copper/PGE deposits including Boliden’s operating Kevitsa mine and the more recently discovered Sakatti nickel/copper/PGE project owned by Anglo American.

n Finland, Kingsrose has been granted four exploration reservations at the Central Finland project in the Kotalahti Nickel Belt, a 400 km long greenstone belt which hosts the past producing Hitura, Kotalahti and Enonkoski nickel mines.