Gold production rose 14.6 percent year on year in the first nine months of 2009, mainly because of the launch of some large projects in the Far East, the Russian Gold Industrialists Union said Monday.

The union, the industry’s lobby group, said in a statement that gold output totaled 151.3 tons in January to September compared with 132 tons in the same period a year ago.

September output from mines and placers declined by nearly 2 tons from the same month a year ago, but a rise of volumes refined as a byproduct of other metals cut the decline to just 0.4 tons.

Output of gold produced as a byproduct of other metals rose 45.2 percent to 13.34 tons in the first nine months of this year, and output achieved by refining gold from scrap declined by 3 percent to 5.31 tons.

Russia produced about 8 percent of the world’s gold last year and plans to significantly increase this share by developing its reserves that are second only to South Africa’s.

It aims to produce 205 tons of gold this year, up 11.1 percent year on year.

The union attributed the latest increase to the launch of production at Kinross Gold’s Kupol mine in the remote Chukotka region, as well as the Karalveyem mine in the same region.