Canada's Roxgold officially opens Ivory Coast gold mine

(This Sept. 15 story has been corrected to clarify that Roxgold is a subsidiary of Fortuna in paragraph 1 and Jorge Ganoza is CEO of Fortuna, not Roxgold, in paragraph 2)

SEGUELA, Ivory Coast (Reuters) - Canada's Roxgold, a subsidiary of Fortuna Silver Mines, on Friday opened its gold mine in the north-western region of Ivory Coast, aiming to produce about 130,000 ounces of gold per year, the company said on Friday.

"We have more than 10 years of mining production ahead of us at Seguela and our ambition is to continue exploring and developing here," Jorge Ganoza, Fortuna's CEO, told reporters.

The Seguela gold mine is about 500 km north of the commercial capital Abidjan.

Ivory Coast, the world's top cocoa producer, is seeking to develop the West African country's long-neglected mining sector to diversify its sources of income.

Gold output is expected to reach 50 tonnes per year, from 48 tonnes in 2022, said Ivory Coast's mines minister, Mamadou Sangafowa Coulibaly.

He added the company had invested about 78 billion CFA francs ($127 million) to build the mine.

The minister said one gold mine would be inaugurated in November in the centre-western region of Daloa and another one next year in the northeast town of Dabakala.

Mining companies also operating in Ivory Coast include Barrick Gold, Endeavour and Perseus mining.

($1 = 612.0000 CFA francs)

(Reporting by Loucoumane Coulibaly; Editing by Anait Miridzhanian and David Evans)