Rio Tinto Group will cancel US$2.3 billion in debt owed by Mongolia as the miner seeks to push forward with expanding the giant Oyu Tolgoi copper project that’s been beset by years of disputes, delays and cost blowouts.
Rio’s Chief Executive Officer Jakob Stausholm proposed improved terms for a 2015 financing agreement that underpins the mine’s underground expansion, according to a Dec. 13 letter to Prime Minister Oyun-Erdene Luvsannamsrai posted on Mongolia’s government website.
This article was produced in partnership with the Pulitzer Center’s Rainforest Investigations Network and the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism.
PALAWAN, Philippines – Jeminda Bartolome spends her days at the foot of a lush mountain range tending to her rice paddies. A mother of six, she leads a group of farmers and members of the Indigenous Palawan tribe who believe the crop is endowed with a human soul. “That,” she said on a recent afternoon pointing toward her farmland, “is our source of livelihood.”
Bartolome, 56, lives in one of the most biodiverse places on earth, a stunning island that draws legions of tourists to its crystal blue waters and pristine nature reserves. But these days, her livelihood, and the ancient rainforest system it depends on, are increasingly under threat.
Tokyo | China will boost domestic iron ore production by 30 per cent, significantly ramp up investments in overseas mines and strengthen scrap steel recycling under a plan designed to break Beijing’s dependency on Australia’s most valuable commodity export.
China’s top steel industry executives and senior government officials outlined a strategy for achieving the five-year targets in an article published this week, which highlights the Chinese government’s frustration with volatile iron ore prices and its desire to follow Japan’s lead by investing heavily in offshore mines.
https://www.nationaljeweler.com/
Basel, Switzerland—The Swiss Gemmological Institute SSEF conducted intensive research on high-quality Afghan emeralds and has released its findings for the trade.
In 2017, the lab started seeing a new kind of emerald from the country’s Panjshir Valley, nearly all of which were fine quality, SSEF Director Michael Krzemnicki said. As they do for all less familiar material, researchers at SSEF decided to study the emeralds extensively to find ways to separate them from others.
South Korea will drastically increase its strategic stockpiles of nickel, cobalt and other critical metals, in a bid to ensure a stable supply of raw materials vital to key industries including electric vehicle batteries and renewable energy, the government said Thursday.
National stockpiles of 35 rare metals — designated by the government — will increase to cover 100 days from the current 57 days, it said. New facilities will be built while some existing ones will be expanded and the state-run Korea Resources Corp. will oversee the overall management.
(Bloomberg) — Chinese firms are showing interest in exploiting Afghanistan’s vast untapped mineral resources as Beijing seeks a role in reconstructing the nation’s war-ravaged economy.
Afghanistan is sitting on deposits estimated to be worth $1 trillion or more, including what may be the world’s largest lithium reserves, a vital component for the energy-storage batteries that are driving the world’s transition away from fossil fuels.
In 1972, Gary Bowersox, a Vietnam War veteran who had owned several retail jewelry stores in Hawaii, paid his first visit to Afghanistan. Determined to grow his burgeoning gem dealing business, he was attracted by the country’s 7,000-year-old deposits of lapis lazuli at Sar-i-Sang in Badakhshan Province, which for millenniums have drawn traders to this ancient crossroads on the border of what is now Tajikistan.
It would become the first of many trips, the most recent of which was less than three months before the Taliban regained control of the country and Western forces withdrew their troops.
Greenland said on Monday it has stripped a Chinese mining company of its licence to an iron ore deposit near the capital Nuuk, dealing a blow to attempts by Chinese companies to gain a foothold on the resource-rich Arctic island.
General Nice, a Chinese coal and iron ore importer, took control of the Isua mine project in 2015, replacing previous owner London Mining, which went bankrupt.
Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, has long been a producer of some of the world’s priciest gemstones: pigeon’s blood rubies. Known by their deep, natural red fluorescence with blue hues, they command higher prices per carat than any precious stone on the global market, with the exception of colored diamonds.
But political conflict and trade embargoes have made rubies from Myanmar highly controversial for more than a decade, creating complicated sourcing problems for jewelers.
https://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/
JAKARTA: Global electric vehicle makers have set their sights on Indonesia, attracted by its abundant reserves of key EV battery ingredient nickel, government backing for the industry and the market potential of the world’s fourth most populous nation.
Such ambitions are on parade at the ongoing Indonesia International Auto Show, on the outskirts of Jakarta. Automakers from China, South Korea and elsewhere are counting on the Indonesian government’s push to increase EV sales, one of the ways in which Jakarta hopes to reduce the country’s CO2 output as it aims for net zero emissions by 2060.
TOKYO — Chinese companies have splurged over $1 billion on rights over three lithium mines in Argentina in as many weeks as a race to secure supplies of the “white gold” critical to most production of electric car batteries revs up.
Argentina, which has lagged Chile and Australia in lithium output, has been reforming laws, reducing taxes and improving infrastructure with an eye toward boosting export revenues.
Nuclear power once seemed like the world’s best hope for a carbon-neutral future. After decades of cost-overruns, public protests and disasters elsewhere, China has emerged as the world’s last great believer, with plans to generate an eye-popping amount of nuclear energy, quickly and at relatively low cost.
China has over the course of the year revealed the extensive scope of its plans for nuclear, an ambition with new resonance given the global energy crisis and the calls for action coming out of the COP26 Climate Summit in Glasgow.
BEIJING — China imported nearly twice as much coal in October as it did a year ago, despite signs the country’s power shortage is easing, according to customs data released Sunday. Monthly purchases of coal reached 26.9 million tons in October, up 96.2% from a year ago, according to data accessed through Wind Information.
However, that was down 18.2% from 32.9 million tons in September. Chinese authorities have rushed to address a coal shortage in the country since late September, after many factories were forced to cut production. By mid-October, the number of Chinese provinces with significant power shortages fell to two, down from 18 at the start of the month, according to the Commonwealth Bank of Australia.
(Bloomberg) — Nuclear power once seemed like the world’s best hope for a carbon-neutral future. After decades of cost-overruns, public protests and disasters elsewhere, China has emerged as the world’s last great believer, with plans to generate an eye-popping amount of nuclear energy, quickly and at relatively low cost.
China has over the course of the year revealed the extensive scope of its plans for nuclear, an ambition with new resonance given the global energy crisis and the calls for action coming out of the COP26 Climate Summit in Glasgow.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/
The video flashed around WhatsApp groups, Twitter and Facebook. Shot at a Chinese-owned copper mine in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, it showed two men screaming and writhing on the dusty ground as soldiers kicked and whipped them, while helmeted managers watched.
It was one of many videos and photos that went viral on Congolese social media in recent months – some real, some fake – all provoking outrage at the alleged mistreatment of local workers by Chinese mining companies.
