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Canadian Media Resource Articles

Mines can create Indigenous middle class in Ring of Fire: Opinion – by Stan Sudol (Toronto Star – August 1, 2017)

https://www.thestar.com/

Ontario needs to follow the lead of Nunavut, where Inuit communities have benefitted from successful gold and iron ore mines.

It’s been 10 years since the world-class Ring of Fire mineral district was discovered in the isolated James Bay Lowlands, about 500 kms northeast of Thunder Bay. Not one mine has been built.

During those 10 years, the equally isolated territory of Nunavut has built two gold mines (Agnico Eagle’s Meadowbank and TMAC Resources’ Doris) and one iron ore operation (Baffinland’s Mary River).

A fourth gold mine (Agnico Eagle) should be in production in 2019 — and Sabina Gold and Silver Corp. A junior exploration company with a very rich precious metal deposit has just been given continued development approvals by the Nunavut Impact Review Board.

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Battle brewing over niobium mine bid near James Bay – by Ainslie Cruickshank (Toronto Star – July 30, 2017)

https://www.thestar.com/

Moose Cree First Nation says protecting lands could help Canada meet climate, UN biodiversity commitments.

A battle is brewing just south of James Bay between Moose Cree First Nation and a resource company that wants to develop the world’s next niobium mine in the heart of its traditional territory.

For now, NioBay Metal Inc. wants a drilling permit to confirm the results of an exploration program undertaken in the 1960s. Down the road, the company has plans to develop an underground mine to produce niobium, a metal that helps make lighter, stronger steel.

NioBay says the mine will cause minimal environmental damage and offers big benefits for Moose Cree, but the First Nation fears otherwise. The proposed mine site sits near the shore of the South Bluff Creek, a culturally significant area for Moose Cree members that borders the North French River Watershed, a region they consider protected. Now, they want the province to protect it too.

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Fertilizer maker Potash Corp beats revenue expectations – by Ahmed Farhatha and Rod Nickel (Reuters Canada – July 27, 2017)

https://ca.reuters.com/

(Reuters) – Canada’s Potash Corp of Saskatchewan reported bigger-than-expected revenue on Thursday as it sold more potash at higher prices compared with a year earlier, marking a slow recovery in the oversupplied market.

Potash prices have rebounded modestly since last year but remain low, under pressure from bloated global capacity and soft crop prices. The Saskatoon, Saskatchewan-based fertilizer producer’s revenue rose 6.4 percent to $1.11 billion, beating the average estimate of $1.09 billion.

Potash Corp’s results were mostly in line with expectations, but the company’s second-half prospects may not be bolstered by improving potash market conditions, disappointing some investors, Citi analyst P.J. Juvekar said.

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Mining warfare in WWI – by Cecilia Keating (CIM Magazine – November 04, 2016)

http://magazine.cim.org/en/

During the critical battles of World War One, skilled miners – many of them Canadian – made Allied victories possible

In the First World War trenches cleaved Europe from the North Sea to Switzerland. While the battlefield above ground was static, a secret subterranean war raged underground.

The British Army began to form specialist army units of trained tunnellers in 1915, initially recruiting men from poor coal mining communities in Britain. Their job was to create a labyrinth of long underground tunnels that extended under enemy lines and could be packed with explosives, and to dig ‘camouflets’, smaller mines used to collapse enemy tunnels. They were also tasked with building extensive networks of tunnels behind Allied lines, allowing for undetected movement of men and supplies.

Faced with growing demand for skilled miners, the British government appealed to Canada to raise tunnelling units, or ‘companies’, in September 1915. The first was mobilised in Pembroke, Ontario and recruited men from mining centres in Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick.

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Cost-cutting miners shine despite range-bound gold prices – by Sunny Freeman (Financial Post – July 28, 2017)

http://business.financialpost.com/

Canadian gold miners posted solid second-quarter profits driven by increasing efficiency at their operations rather than any stellar increase in the price of gold. Toronto-based miners Barrick Gold Corp. and Agnico Eagle Mines Ltd. and Vancouver-based Goldcorp Inc. all surprised analysts with earnings that beat expectations as they continue to drive down their cost of sales.

Historically, the performance of gold companies tends to move in tandem with bullion prices, but the miners better-than-expected year-over-year results came even as the price of gold during the quarter remained virtually flat — up just three per cent over the year before.

Gold companies have been focused on driving down cash costs and paring their portfolios to deal with a years-long decline in the commodities market and those moves during bust times appear to be paying off as the cycle begins to make a more positive shift.

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Cathedraltown cow just one of family developer’s personal design cues – by Scott Wheeler (Toronto Star – July 27, 2017)

https://www.thestar.com/

Helen Roman-Barber is the daughter of uranium mining magnate Stephen B. Roman, the second most important man in Canadian mining history: http://bit.ly/2gLWkjj

Deli restaurant owner Zane Caplansky has a message for Markham residents upset about the massive cow statue the city installed in their front yards: I’ll take it!

“If you’ve got a beef with that statue, you’ve got a beef with me, because I’m all about beef,” he said Thursday, less than 48 hours after Charity Crescent homeowners met with Councillor Alan Ho to express distaste over the cow their street is named after.

But the donor of the statue, Helen Roman-Barber, who is developing Markham’s Cathedraltown neighbourhood in honour of her family’s deep history in the area, has different plans. “Good luck, guy. Good luck, guy,” she said.

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Shocks to Canada’s natural resource sector should be the real cover story – by John Ivison (National Post – July 27, 2017)

http://nationalpost.com/

As the prime minister graces the cover of Rolling Stone, the real news this week is how two major natural resources projects have been scuttled by government and the courts

The fawning front cover of the latest Rolling Stone, which features Justin Trudeau and wonders wistfully, “Why can’t he be our President?” also touts a headline promising to explain how the Trump administration is destroying the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Many Canadians will rejoice at the contrast — and, it’s true, few would exchange Trudeau’s golden aura for Trump’s tangerine tincture. But the idea that Trudeau is getting everything right — particularly when it comes to balancing environmental protection and growing the economy — is fallacious. The government is touting the International Monetary Fund’s forecast that Canada will lead the G7 in growth this year. But there is a lag before government action affects the economy.

The warning this week from the Chamber of Commerce that Canada’s climate-change plan and other measures are raising the cost of doing business in this country to breaking point is a canary in the coal mine, gasping from exposure to the toxic gases of too many taxes and too much regulation.

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Mining Giants Post Red-Hot Results in Lukewarm Gold Market – by Danielle Bochove (Bloomberg News – July 27, 2017)

https://www.bloomberg.com/

Four of the world’s top gold companies were in full “beats” mode in the second quarter, wringing more value out of their mines amid tepid gold prices.

A day after Newmont Mining Corp. reported higher-than-expected adjusted profits by extracting more gold at lower costs, Canada-based Barrick Gold Corp., Goldcorp Inc. and Agnico Eagle Mines Ltd. followed suit Wednesday.

“It’s the night of the beats,” Andrew Kaip, a Toronto-based analyst at BMO Capital Markets, said by telephone. “The read here is that their optimization programs are continuing to deliver and their capacity to improve their operational outlook continues to have momentum.”

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NEB can fulfill duty to consult Indigenous groups, top court rules – by Shawn McCarthy (Globe and Mail – July 27, 2017)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

OTTAWA — The Supreme Court of Canada affirmed Wednesday that Indigenous people do not have a veto over resource projects affecting their traditional territory, even as it quashed a regulatory permit for an oil-exploration program that Inuit residents of Baffin Island feared would damage their hunting rights.

Residents of Clyde River – population 1,100 – fought an uphill battle against a consortium of multinational oil service companies that planned to conduct seismic testing to assess the oil and gas potential of offshore sites. The top court agreed that the regulatory agency had failed to adequately assess the risk posed by the seismic testing to the community’s treaty rights to hunt bowhead whales, narwhal, seals and polar bears.

In a companion ruling, the Supreme Court rejected a challenge by a First Nations community that argued the government had failed to properly consult and accommodate its concerns when the regulatory agency approved Enbridge Inc.’s project to reverse the flow of its existing Line 9 pipeline through Ontario to Quebec.

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Globe editorial: The ‘duty to consult’ Indigenous Canadians, and its limits (Globe and Mail – July 27, 2017)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Indigenous Canadian communities have unique rights under Section 35 of the Constitution. These protections, covering pre-existing rights and those acquired by treaty, are extensive – but some are also limited.

That’s the takeaway from a pair of Supreme Court rulings released Wednesday. One considered the National Energy Board’s approval of an oil and gas exploration project, over the objections of an Inuit community; the Court struck the project down. The other case looked at the NEB’s approval of the Line 9 pipeline reversal in Ontario; the Court said that, even though an affected Indigenous community was opposed to the project, the regulator had properly consulted and properly approved it.

At issue in both cases is the Crown’s “duty to consult.” When a development – like a pipeline or an oil-exploration project – has an impact on an Indigenous community’s rights, such as the right to hunt or fish on traditional native territory, they must be adequately consulted.

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Freeport stock soars 15 percent on copper prices, permit progress – by Susan Taylor (Reuters U.S. – July 25, 2017)

https://www.reuters.com/

TORONTO (Reuters) – Freeport-McMoRan Inc shares jumped to a 16-month high on Tuesday, as soaring metal prices and progress in a long-running, costly permit dispute with Indonesia buoyed the world’s biggest publicly traded copper miner.

Investors brushed aside quarterly results and full-year forecasts that were short of expectations, focusing instead on a two-year high for copper prices and Chief Executive Officer Richard Adkerson’s confidence in securing a new mining agreement by October for Freeport’s giant Grasberg mine.

Freeport’s stock surged nearly 15 percent on the New York Stock Exchange by mid-day Tuesday, making it the top performer on the S&P 500 Index as it outpaced gains by fellow copper miners.

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Protecting Canadians from fake eco news – by Peter Foster (Financial Post – July 26,2017)

http://business.financialpost.com/

There seems to be a radical disconnect between the claim — splashed breathlessly atop the front page of The Globe and Mail on Monday — that Canada is failing to protect its environment and the fact that securing approval for any piece of hinterland development these days amounts to a slog through an endless bog of regulation and review.

According to the Globe story, which was based on the annual report conveniently leaked in advance to it by the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society, CPAWS, Canada is lagging commitments made under the UN’s Convention on Biodiversity. Since 2010, its “protected” areas have increased from “only” 9.6 per cent to 10.6 per cent of the country, versus the commitment of 17 per cent by 2020 made by the Harper government.

The first question is why the Harper government would have allowed itself to be roped into such an exercise in subversive calculation. All such commitments really do is to provide a fundraising soapbox for radical environmental NGOs.

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‘A tragedy for Canada’: Petronas cancels $36B LNG project as B.C. jacks up demands – by Claudia Cattaneo (Financial Post – July 26, 2017)

http://business.financialpost.com/

British Columbia’s new NDP/Green coalition government was in damage control mode after the most ambitious of the province’s proposed liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects, the $36-billion Pacific NorthWest LNG, was cancelled Tuesday.

Both the province and the Malaysian company that proposed it blamed poor global LNG market conditions. The truth is that what should have been a magnificent new Canadian industry, building middle-class jobs from exporting Western Canada’s world-class Montney shale gas to reduce carbon pollution in Asia, has unraveled due in large part to government mishandling — plus fears it would have only accelerated under the new, anti-development provincial government.

The proof is that the LNG export industry is thriving in the United States under the same global market conditions, while B.C. has yet to see the construction of a single project out of 20 or so proposed since 2011. Dennis McConaghy, a former senior executive at energy company TransCanada Corp., called the decision “a tragedy for Canada … a real condemnation of this country and the utterly unproductive entities in it that simply make any development virtually impossible.”

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Globe editorial: The unspoken problem in Pikangikum (Globe and Mail – July 26, 2017)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

“There’s no doubt in my mind,” Ontario Health Minister Eric Hoskins said last week of the First Nations community of Pikangikum, “that it’s a community in crisis.” With all due respect to Dr. Hoskins, it would require willful blindness to arrive at any other conclusion.

Pikangikum, a remote Ojibwa community of about 2,800 in northwestern Ontario, has been in a state of crisis for decades. In 2000, a British sociologist calculated that it had the world’s highest suicide rate, at 213 suicides per 100,000 people.

In 2012, Maclean’s magazine famously dubbed it “the suicide capital of the world,” after the rate reached 250 per 100,000 people. Many more have died by suicide since then, the latest being four youths this month, including two 12-year-olds.

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Ring of Pants-on-Fire: Kathleen Wynne’s ‘weeks, not months’ deadline blows by – by John Michael McGrath (TV Ontario – July 25, 2017)

http://tvo.org/

OPINION: This spring, Ontario’s premier seemed determined to speed up negotiations on developing the mineral-rich Ring of Fire — then, nothing happened.

Neither Premier Kathleen Wynne nor the Ontario Liberals generally are predisposed to playing the heavy with Indigenous communities. The Grits won the 2003 election partly on a pledge to establish better relations with Indigenous people, in contrast with the acrimony — and violence — of the Mike Harris years. Wynne has made reconciliation a personal mission in her time as premier.

So it was notable that she wrote a letter this spring to the Matawa Chiefs Council urging a speedy resolution to negotiations on developing the Ring of Fire, a mineral-rich region northeast of Thunder Bay that’s smack-dab in the middle of multiple First Nations territories. Wynne said she hoped for “meaningful progress in weeks, not months” on an agreement to build transportation infrastructure to the chromite and nickel deposits there.

Well, it’s been months, not weeks, yet the government has announced no major progress on an agreement, and the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines had no new details to report this week in response to inquiries from TVO.org.

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