Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Catherine McLeod-Seltzer, I am the chair of your board of directors. It is my pleasure to welcome you to the 2023 annual meeting of the shareholders of Kinross Gold Corporation. Kinross has decided to hold this year's meeting virtually so that we may continue to provide the enhanced flexibility and opportunity for shareholder participation, irrespective of their geographic location and share ownership. Improvements in conferencing technology have also made it possible to hold virtual meetings with greater reliability and cost efficiency. As a result, Kinross has determined that it is expedient to hold the meeting virtually via a live audio webcast. We thank you for attending the meeting as we strive to provide the same level of disclosure, transparency, and participation as our in-person meetings.
I would like to note that Kinross is permitted to hold a virtual meeting of its shareholders , both under the Ontario Business Corporations Act and our bylaws. Voting on items of business to be considered at the meeting has been open from 9:45 A.M., and polls will remain open until the formal business of the meeting is completed, at which time I will declare the polling closed on all items of business. I will also pause briefly for you to vote as you go through the items of business today. Shareholders who have voted in advance are not required to vote again during the meeting unless they wish to change their voting instructions. Shareholders may submit questions for the board or management through the question box on the virtual meeting page. Instructions on how to ask questions and the voting procedure will appear on your screens.
The moderator will relay the questions, and they will be addressed after the CEO presentation. Joining me electronically this morning are the other director nominees, Paul Rollinson, President and CEO of the company, members of the senior leadership team of Kinross, and Luke Crosby, the Corporate Secretary of Kinross. Also joining us is Mr. David Oldham, partner of KPMG, the company's auditors. A recording of this meeting will be available on Kinross' website and on the meeting portal after the meeting. Pursuant to the bylaws, I, as chair of the corporation, will chair the meeting, and I'll appoint Luke Crosby, Corporate Secretary of the corporation, as secretary of the meeting. Further appoint Computershare Investor Services Inc. through its representative, Paul Allen, to act as scrutineers. The notice calling this meeting of shareholders was mailed on April 3rd, 2023 to all the shareholders of record on March 15th, 2023.
The secretary will attach to the minutes of this meeting the Declaration of Computershare Investor Services, Inc. confirming the mailing of the notice of meeting. The scrutineers have submitted their preliminary report on attendance. It shows that voters of more than 816,679,978 common shares, representing approximately 66.53% of the outstanding common shares, are represented at today's meeting. As a result, we have a quorum for the meeting. In order to expedite the formal part of the meeting, I ask Samantha Sheffield and Cassandra Spezza, both shareholders of the corporation, to move and second each motion. Notice having been given in accordance with the bylaws and a quorum being present, I declare that the meeting is duly constituted for the transaction of business.
The minutes of the previous annual meeting of Kinross, held on May 11th, 2022, may be requested by contacting the Corporate Secretary of the corporation. Prior to commencing our items of business, I would like to report that the consolidated financial statements for the fiscal year ended December 31st, 2022, including the balance sheet and accompanying statements, together with the auditor's report, are all contained in the annual report previously made available to shareholders. Printed copies of the annual report may be requested by contacting the corporate secretary of the corporation. The first item of business is the election of 10 directors to hold office until the next annual meeting of shareholders or until their successors are elected or appointed. At this time, I would like to take the opportunity to name the other director nominees who are present on this call.
We have Ian Atkinson, Kerry Dyte, Glenn Ives, Ave Lethbridge, Elizabeth McGregor, Kelly Osborne, Paul Rollinson, David Scott, and Michael Lewis joining us. I will now request a nomination for the 10 nominees named in the Management Information Circular for today's meeting.
I nominate the 10 nominees named in the Management Information Circular for election to the Board of Directors of the Corporation.
I second the director nominations.
If you have not already done so, you may now vote for the election of directors. As the number of nominees is equal to the number of directors required to be elected, I now declare Ian Atkinson, Kerry Dyte, Glenn Ives, Ave Lethbridge, Elizabeth McGregor, Catherine McLeod-Seltzer, Kelly Osborne, Paul Rollinson, David Scott, and Michael Lewis, elected as directors of the corporation to hold office until the next annual meeting of shareholders or until their successors are duly elected or appointed. The next item of business is the appointment of KPMG LLP to serve as auditors of the corporation until the next annual meeting of shareholders and authorizing the directors to fix the auditors' remuneration. May I have a motion to approve and second the appointment.
I so move.
I second the motion.
The motion has been moved and seconded.
If you have not already done so, you may now vote your shares for the election of auditors. The last item of business is the advisory resolution respecting Kinross' approach to executive compensation. Details of Kinross’ approach to the compensation of its executives and the text of the proposed advisory resolution are included in the Management Information Circular. May I have a motion to approve that resolution?
I so move.
I second the motion.
The motion has been moved and seconded. If you have not already done so, you may now vote your shares on the advisory resolution with respect to executive compensation. I now declare the voting closed on all items of business. The scrutineers have completed their preliminary count of the votes cast and have received the results. I declare that all the motions have passed.
A report on all matters voted on at the meeting will be filed on SEDAR+. This concludes the formal business of the meeting. Before handing it over to Paul Rollinson for his CEO remarks, I would like to note that Kinross is celebrating a significant milestone this year as it celebrates its 30th anniversary. The mining sector is characterized by cyclical patterns, and Kinross has successfully navigated many cycles with the ongoing support of its shareholders. This support has enabled Kinross to build a strong foundation based on our core purpose, generating value for our shareholders and ensuring a sustainable future for the company. On behalf of the board, thank you for your continued support and engagement. To the senior management and our global team, thank you for all your hard work towards delivering safely on our shared goals.
I would now like to turn the meeting over to Paul, who will provide an overview of the company .
Thank you, Catherine, and thank you to everyone for taking the time to join us for our virtual annual general meeting. Before I get started, let me call your attention to our cautionary statement on forward-looking information. As a reminder, shareholders may submit questions through the messaging icon on the screen, and we will address them at the end of my remarks. I'd like to begin by introducing members of our senior leadership team, all of whom are on the call. They are Andrea Freeborough, Executive Vice-President and Chief Financial Officer, Kathleen Grandy, Senior Vice-President, Human Resources, Claude Schimper, Executive Vice-President and Chief Operating Officer, Ned Jalil, Senior Vice-President and Chief Technical Officer, and Jeff Gold, Executive Vice-President, Corporate Development, External Relations, and Chief Legal Officer.
Today, I will discuss the changes in our portfolio over the last year, highlights from our operational and financial performance, both in 2022 and Q1 2023, our current capital returns framework, and our ongoing commitment to ESG and our climate change strategy. In 2022, our team navigated a variety of complex challenges, including significant geopolitical events, inflation, and some new project ramp-up issues. I'm very proud of how our team managed these challenges and believe our business is well-positioned moving forward. Last year, we successfully exited Russia and divested our mine in Ghana. Offsetting this, we added a world-class development project in Canada with the acquisition of Great Bear. The result is that our portfolio is now repositioned and largely centered in the Americas. I will discuss the exciting Great Bear project in more detail shortly.
Our company is also in a strong operational and financial position. Looking out, we expect to produce approximately 2 million ounces in each of the next 3 years. Our diverse portfolio is in excellent shape and is backed by two tier one assets, Paracatu and Tasiast, a world-class development project in Canada, Great Bear, a growing business in Chile, and the fact that 70% of our production now comes from the Americas. In 2022, our two cornerstone assets, Tasiast and Paracatu, continued to deliver stable, low-cost production, and together accounted for over 50% of our gold production. These two mines are again expected to deliver over 1 million ounces this year and are expected to remain key contributors to our production profile for many years to come. In February of last year, our La Coipa Mine in Chile poured its first gold bar after we restarted operations.
La Coipa represents a growing contributor within our portfolio. Our culture at Kinross is highly focused on generating value while mining responsibly. Specifically, we remain focused on operational project and exploration excellence, maintaining balance sheet strength, and generating returns for our shareholders, and prioritizing ESG, which I will discuss shortly. With respect to operational priorities, as always, we continue to focus on safely meeting our production targets while striving to achieve high margin production. We will also focus on advancing our development projects and executing our company-wide exploration strategy as we look to maintain a robust pipeline of organic growth opportunities. Our portfolio of development projects continues to underpin our future growth strategy. At Great Bear, we made excellent progress following the acquisition early last year by exceeding our drilling targets and completing approximately 225,000 meters of diamond drilling.
Our initial resource, announced in February, delivered approximately five million indicated and inferred ounces , all largely coming from the first 500 meters of depth. This is just the starting point for this high-quality deposit, which we believe has all the characteristics needed to establish a large, long life mining complex. Ongoing drilling has been encouraging, with recent results confirming gold mineralization with large widths and high grades below the initial resource, including at depths of more than 1 kilometer, continuing to confirm our thesis and showcasing the tremendous potential that lies ahead. At Tasiast, we are progressing well on the 24k expansion project. We successfully completed a planned shutdown in February, we remain on schedule to reach throughput of 24,000 tons per day by the middle of this year.
We expect to achieve this throughput level on a sustained basis by the end of this year. We remain on track to achieve our full year production target of 610,000 ounces. In addition to the 24k expansion, we have also begun procurement and construction activities at the Tasiast Solar Plant, which remains on schedule for completion in the second half of this year. In Alaska, Manh Choh is advancing well following the completion of a feasibility study last year. Currently, construction activities remain on schedule and on budget, with the early works program progressing as planned. The initial production at the project is expected in late 2024. Our exploration strategy is also an important component of our future growth. 2022 marked a successful year for our exploration team.
In 2022, a total of 336 kilometers of drilling was completed across all exploration projects, including the 225 kilometers at Great Bear. Highlights of the 2022 brownfields exploration program included promising results at the company's North American assets, Round Mountain, Curlew Basin, Bald Mountain, and Fort Knox. The 2022 programs focused on expanding key targets, positioning us to further test higher grade zones this year. In 2022, greenfields exploration programs focused on targets in Canada, Nevada, and Finland, with approximately 49 kilometers of drilling completed on all projects. We anticipate spending $150 million for our company-wide exploration program this year, slightly more than we spent last year. We have budgeted $50 million for exploration at Great Bear alone to follow up on last year's exploration success.
This year, we will explore additional targets at the LP zone along strike and at depth, with the goal of further delineating the deposit at depth. We also plan to explore the broader land package. Exploration at Round Mountain will focus on Phase X and Gold Hill opportunities. At Curlew Basin, we plan to continue building on our resource. As we reflect on 2022, which represented a year of extraordinary headwinds, including geopolitical events, substantial cost inflation, and somewhat stagnant gold price. I am proud of how our team responded proactively and were able to successfully improve operational performance in the latter part of the year. To sum up our performance in the last year, Kinross delivered production of nearly 2 million ounces with robust margins of $856 per ounce.
We generated $1 billion in operating cash flow and almost $240 million in free cash flow, finishing the year with a cash balance of $418 million and a total liquidity of $1.8 billion. We also returned more than $450 million in capital to shareholders through dividends and our share buyback program. Turning now to our Q1 results, which we announced yesterday. We produced approximately 466,000 ounces at a cash cost of sales of $987 per ounce in line with our plans. Notably, in Q1, Tasiast delivered another strong quarter of production, achieving two record production months in January and March. Production at Paracatu, La Coipa, and our U.S. operations were all as expected.
We remain on track to achieve our 2.1 million ounce production guidance for this year. Our cash and liquidity position remained strong at the end of the quarter, with $471 million of cash and $1.7 billion of liquidity. With respect to our balance sheet, we have an investment grade rating from all three agencies, and we continue to have very strong liquidity. In the current economic environment, our business is generating strong cash flow, and we expect to de-lever our balance sheet as we progress through the year. With respect to capital returns, as I indicated, we returned $455 million to shareholders through our regular dividend and our share buyback program last year.
We repurchased $300 million in shares in 2022, completing our buyback commitment and meeting our objective of buying back the shares we issued in the Great Bear transaction. This year, we plan to continue paying our quarterly dividend of $0.03 per share, and our share buyback program also remains in place. Last year, we invested over $750 million into our business through sustaining and growth capital expenditures. This year, we expect total capital spend to be approximately $1 billion. Looking beyond this year, we will continue to optimize our CapEx program so that it supports the needs of our targeted long-term production profile of approximately 2 million ounces per annum. ESG is ingrained in all facets of our business and is embedded in our culture and our core values.
I'm pleased to say that in 2022, Kinross once again continued to rank well among our peers in major ESG rankings and ratings. We also updated our ESG strategy, focusing on the following three core pillars: Workforce and Community , Natural Capital , and Climate Change and Energy . In addition, we strengthened our ESG governance structure, including quarterly reporting by our ESG executive committee to our board of directors. Yesterday, we released our sustainability and ESG report, which is now in its 15th year. The report provides a comprehensive update on the progress we made in 2022 and what we aim to achieve in 2023 and beyond. Some highlights from the report include: In 2022, we generated nearly $3 billion in economic benefits to host countries through taxes, wages, procurement, and community support.
We sustained high levels of local employment with 99% of our workforce and 87% of our management from within host countries. We advanced diversity, equity, and inclusion targets, achieving the highest percentage of female participation in Kinross's workforce in the last five years. We ranked as the highest mining company surveyed in the Global Mines Annual Corporate Governance Review. We received the Alaska Miners Association's Environmental Stewardship Award for best management practices in environmental protection as part of the Abandoned Mine Initiative. In early 2022, we also introduced our climate change strategy, which outlines a comprehensive greenhouse gas reduction plan on our path to a net- zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. We have set an interim target to achieve a 30% reduction of Scope 1 and Scope 2 greenhouse gas emissions intensity per gold ounce produced by 2030.
As I mentioned earlier, we are currently developing a 34 megawatt solar plant at Tasiast, which will save 530,000 tons in greenhouse gas emissions over the life of the mine. We also signed a power purchase agreement for 100% renewable power at La Coipa. Climate change is a key consideration in our overall business strategy, including building in emissions forecast directly into mine and project models. At Kinross, we are dedicated to supporting the local communities where we operate. In 2022, we donated $10 million in monetary and in-kind community investments in host countries. In Alaska, Kinross made a $1 million donation to the Troth Yeddhaʼ Indigenous Studies Center at the University of Alaska. In Chile, we are partnering with the local indigenous Colla community in the Atacama region on a variety of legacy projects.
In that regard, we'd like to share a short video that provides details on the various projects and initiatives with the people of the Colla community.
At Kinross, we are dedicated to supporting the development visions of the local communities where we operate. In Chile, we are partnering with the local indigenous Colla community in the Atacama region on a wide variety of projects to preserve the community's cultural heritage, empower women and young people through capacity building, and support adult literacy and entrepreneurship programs.
To execute Kinross's project with the Colla community, we have partnered with the Fundación Ser Humano, a local nonprofit organization. Identity is fundamental to any community. To build familiarity and respect for local Quechua heritage, last year, boys and girls from the local Coya indigenous community participated in twice-weekly workshops to study the Quechua language, culture, and traditional lifestyle. During the virtual workshops, participants learned about their linguistic traditions and how their ancestors learned to live with the local flora and fauna. They heard stories, legends, and experiences from both teachers and community elders. Kinross also supported the Coya indigenous community in a project designed to study, preserve, and strengthen local native flora. The project involved researching soil, mineral, and water tables to better understand how to ensure native plants continue to grow and thrive and how they can be used in ancestral medicine.
Weaving is an important part of the Colla people's heritage. Kinross held a day-long community loom workshop to give participants hands-on experience in operating traditional Colla and decorative looms. Participants left with a new appreciation of this part of their colorful heritage. In the Pai-Ote community, boys and girls participated in a traditional cheesemaking workshop. In the first session, participants learned about goats, their diet and nutrition, and how they are milked. Later sessions focused on grazing and herding, on straining goat milk, and the process of cheesemaking. The final session took place in the local Pai-Ote community on the day of the celebration of mothers. Kinross has equipped the community with cheesemaking equipment, maturing chambers, refrigeration and preparation areas, and solar power, facilitating artisanal cheese production. Once the community receives required water permits, it will be ready to start commercial production.
Kinross is supporting the community's aspiration of commercializing its cheesemaking to preserve this cultural tradition for generations to come. Last year, the Kinross-sponsored Active Communities program entered its phase III in partnership with the organization Desafío Levantemos Chile. The program is designed to help local entrepreneurs generate and develop business ideas. Kinross ran a series of four training sessions with aspiring local entrepreneurs to help them develop their proposals, conduct site visits to learn about projects, and provide coaching to help them develop their business ideas and move them towards actualization. Of the 23 participants, 22 were women, and many have started small businesses for which Kinross has provided seed funding. In two communities, 11 people are dedicated to textiles productions, including Túpaj Maki from the Pastos Grandes community and Corazón de Cordillera from the Sol Naciente community.
For many adult members of the Colla community in the remote Atacama foothills, educational opportunities in their youth were limited. Now, through a program implemented since 2016 in partnership with the Reducate Foundation and the Ministry of Education, they have the opportunity to return to secondary school. To date, 32 community members, including five senior citizens, have taken advantage of the program to complete their mid-secondary school program, with another 30 actively engaged in the program. These programs are another way for Kinross to express the respect for the rich local heritage in the Atacama region and listen to the Colla community about programs that are important to them to help preserve cultural patrimony and build for a successful future.
In conclusion, I'd like to thank our employees and everyone who joined us today for this presentation and for your continued support. After navigating through a challenging year in 2022, I believe we are well positioned as we look forward. The outlook of our business is supported by a sizable reserve and resource base, a substantial production profile capable of delivering 2 million ounces per annum, a repositioned portfolio with 70% of our production expected to come from the Americas, exciting development projects and exploration opportunities, including the world-class Great Bear project, a strong balance sheet with strong free cash flow, and a commitment to responsible mining that has made us a leader in ESG performance within the industry. We'll now open it up for questions from our shareholders.
There are no questions at this time.
Thanks, Victoria. In that regard, then, I would just say thanks to everyone for joining today. This concludes the annual general meeting. We look forward to meeting with you in the future.