Integrated Interpretation of Regional Geoscientific Data for Mineral Exploration in Colombia: Marmato Target Example

Summary The Colombian government, through the Servicio Geologico Colombiano (SGC), is committed to the social and economic development of their country. One way in which the SGC strive to attain this goal is through the identification of prospective areas for mineral exploration within Colombia. The resource potential of selected areas is evaluated through the collection and integration of regional geological, geochemical and geophysical data. The SGC has developed a workflow to accomplish this and an example from the Marmato area is presented to demonstrate its effectiveness. The Marmato example utilizes data collected in the vicinity of an existing epithermal gold deposit. The results show that careful geoscientific data integration, even at a regional scale, can provide a good correlation with the known mineralization. This example comprises less than one per cent (by area) of the geophysical data collected by the SGC. The remaining ninety-nine per cent of the data covers many highly prospective areas and by making this data publicly available the Colombian government hopes to encourage exploration throughout the country.