Ontario Mining – Page 302 – Republic of Mining

Be Not Afraid of Greatness or Sudbury: A Cosmic Accident – by Kenneth Hayes (Part 2 of 2)

August 27, 2011August 27, 2011

Sudbury-born Kenneth Hayes currently teaches architectural history at the University of Toronto.

This essay was commissioned by the Musagetes Foundation on the occasion of the Musagetes Sudbury Cafe. It appears in the book Sudbury: Life in a Northern Town / Sudbury: au nord de notre vie.

Musagetes is a private foundation based in Guelph, Ontario which seeks to transform contemporary life by working with artists, cultural mediators, public intellectuals and other partners to develop new approaches to building community and culture.

Kenneth Hayes – Be Not Afraid of Greatness or Sudbury: A Cosmic Accident (Part 2 of 2)

Sudbury’s development displays some of these features in their later, more advanced forms. The “I” in Inco’s name proclaimed the venture international, but the dominant company in the exploitation of Sudbury’s ore reserves was essentially American. Inco may nominally have been based in Toronto, but Canada’s role in this relationship was at best that of junior partner in a kind of corporate suzerainty.

Falconbridge, the newer and smaller corporation in Sudbury, generally enjoyed a better reputation than Inco, but it was not that different. In fact, the rivalry between Inco and Falconbridge over the course of the twentieth century often had the unreal air of a duopoly — the minimum diversity required to maintain the appearance of open competition while colluding for the same ends. (11) In the last decade, Inco and Falconbridge were purchased, respectively, by the giant mining corporations Vale, from Brazil, and Xstrata, from Switzerland. This situation is still regarded (not without some degree of xenophobia) as abnormal, but the truth is that Sudbury has never really ruled itself.

Understandably, diversification has been Sudbury’s cultural and economic mandate in recent decades. Fuelled by the North’s long-standing regionalist grievances, the city went through a phase of public investment that resulted in the creation of the Taxation Data Centre, Science North and improved health-care and educational facilities, but there are now signs that vigorous private initiative is rising from the thrall of the mines, and doing so in Sudbury’s own inimitable way.

[MAC’s Pierre Gratton says] embrace foreign investment – by Carol Mulligan (Sudbury Star – August 26, 2011)

August 26, 2011

The Sudbury Star, the City of Greater Sudbury’s daily newspaper. cmulligan@thesudburystar.com

“We have already succeeded as Canadians on the global
mining stage. We are every-where…Canada’s voice is
loud, the Canadian industry is loud, our expertise is
used everywhere, our government legislation is copied
everywhere. We have nothing to fear about our place
in the world.” (Pierre Gratton, President and CEO,
Mining Association of Canada)

It can be a difficult message to deliver, but someone has to do it, says the head of an organization that calls itself the voice of the mining industry in Canada.

Foreign investment in mining companies is a good thing and should not be feared, says Pierre Gratton.

In Sudbury, for instance, the billions in investments that Vale is looking to make in its Sudbury operations might not have been made by the former Inco Ltd.

Gratton, president and chief executive officer of the Mining Association of Canada, urged an audience of 200 people Thursday to “avoid protectionism.”

Sudbury ready to cash in [on mining investments] – by Carol Mulligan

September 13, 2018August 26, 2011

The Sudbury Star, the City of Greater Sudbury’s daily newspaper. cmulligan@thesudburystar.com

“If we do the right things, mining can literally help
dig Ontario out of its debt.” (Chris Hodgson, President
and CEO Ontario Mining Association)

Sudbury is well-positioned to benefit from that mining
boom because it has the largest integrated mining complex
in the world and one of the largest nickel-copper
sulphide bodies. (Pierre Gratton, President and CEO,
Mining Association of Canada)

Sudbury stands to benefit from investments in mining operations to the tune of about $5.2 billion in the next five years. That’s a healthy percentage of the $136.4 billion in capital expected to be invested in mining projects throughout Canada from 2012 to 2017.

All of those billions will go into mining projects already in existence, says the president and chief executive officer of the Mining Association of Canada.

That doesn’t include private and public money that may be invested in projects to develop, mine, smelt and transport chromite from the Ring of Fire in northwestern Ontario.

Pierre Gratton was one of two guests who spoke to the Greater Sudbury Chamber of Commerce on Thursday about how the city can benefit from the current up cycle in the metals industry.

China will continue to be a mineral price driver as its econo my continues to grow at double-digit rates. That demand is long-term, with expectations its growth will still be in the 6% to 9% range from 2020-2025.

OMA President points out a greater potential for mining in Ontario

September 13, 2018August 26, 2011

This article was provided by the Ontario Mining Association (OMA), an organization that was established in 1920 to represent the mining industry of the province.

Ontario Mining Association President Chris Hodgson presented a positive vision for the future of mining in Ontario at a Greater Sudbury Chamber of Commerce President’s Series Luncheon event today. Sharing the podium with Mr. Hodgson was Pierre Gratton, President of the Mining Association of Canada.

A sell-out crowd of about 200 attended the gathering, which was held at Bryston’s On The Park in Copper Cliff. Mr. Hodgson’s remarks were based on the OMA document “Action Plan for Ontario: Taking Advantage of a Critical Window of Opportunity,” which is available on the OMA website www.oma.on.ca.

This vision sees mining helping all Ontarians achieve greater prosperity and a greener economy with more concerted government support and a deliberate strategy. Increasingly rapid globalization and urbanization have analysts around the world anticipating unprecedented commodity demand in the next two decades. For a jurisdiction like Ontario with an enviable geological endowment, this is a call to action.

OMA member Agnico-Eagle puts some teeth into health and education initiatives in Mexico

May 16, 2012August 23, 2011

This article was provided by the Ontario Mining Association (OMA), an organization that was established in 1920 to represent the mining industry of the province.

Ontario Mining Association member Agnico-Eagle Mines is engaged in a number of ongoing health and education programs in communities near its Mexican operation. The company’s Pinos Altos mine is located 220 kilometres west of Chihuahua in northern Mexico. At an elevation of more than 2,000 metres, the mine, which has 972 employees and another 127 contractor employees on site, is near the town of Cahuisori and the smaller more isolated communities of Jesus del Monte and La Bateria.

“Our community relations team has developed a proactive community relations program that strives to support the local communities in the areas of greatest need,” said Dale Coffin, Corporate Director Communications for Agnico-Eagle. “We believe that initiatives should come from the community because they stand a better chance of being carried forward in the future.”

One program involves the organization of local dental clinics through the assistance of dentists from the University of Chihuahua. This initiative, which brings dental service to people’s doorsteps, provides local residents with free check-ups, x-rays, extractions and treatment. In 2010, four clinics provided service for about 360 patients in their own communities.

Mining builds communities across Ontario — Timmins

August 22, 2011

This article was provided by the Ontario Mining Association (OMA), an organization that was established in 1920 to represent the mining industry of the province.

There is little doubt that today Noah and Jules Timmins would not recognize the little community they helped to found – and provide its name – in 1912. However, one thing which has remained constant in the development of Timmins as the town has grown from 974 people when it started to a population of more than 46,000 today has been — and is — mining.

In 1912, the Dome, McIntyre and Hollinger gold mine headframes could be seen on the horizon. Today, Xstrata Copper, Goldcorp, Lake Shore Gold, St. Andrew Goldfields, Brigus Gold and Luzenac talc all have mineral producing operations in the area. In addition, De Beers Canada uses Timmins as its base for the Victor diamond mine near Attawapiskat and Detour Gold is relying on the community to support its new gold mine in the Cochrane area.

Christy Marinig, Chief Executive Officer at the Timmins Economic Development Corporation (TEDC), points out there is a great deal of mineral exploration being carried out at this time and that the region of Timmins service area covers about 118,000 people. “We are born out of mining and mining is still the leading economic driver,” she said.

Betting on platinum group metals – by Rita Poliakow (Sudbury Star – August 20, 2011)

August 20, 2011

The Sudbury Star, the City of Greater Sudbury’s daily newspaper.

I don’t know where I am. I don’t know the people around me and I can’t pronounce the word palladium. Actually, I’m not even sure what it is. A mineral, I suppose, because Harry Barr, of Pacific North West Capital Corp., seems really excited about it.

Palladium’s price, it seems, has soared, making the River Valley exploration project, just outside of Sudbury, a possible financial gold mine. The mining exploration company specializes in platinum group metals, which includes platinum, palladium, ruthenium, rhodium, osmium and iridium.

These metals can be as rare as gold. And as profitable.

Standing around River Valley, an exploration site owned by Pacific North West about 100 km from Sudbury, I realize what this article has turned into. Far from an introduction to mining, it’s more like one of those “What doesn’t belong” games. And the answer, in case you haven’t guessed, is me.

Round two for Ring of Fire’s Richard Nemis – by Norm Tollinsky (Sudbury Mining Solutions Journal – September, 2011)

August 19, 2011

This article was originally published in the September, 2011 issue of Sudbury Mining Solutions Journal and written by editor Norm Tollinsky.

“If the financiers in downtown Toronto see any kind of risk,
they move on to the next thing. They’re looking at it
[Ring of Fire] and saying ‘We love the Hudson Bay Lowlands
and we think there’s going to be all kinds of things found
in the future, but we don’t know when that’s going to happen,
so our money is going to go to shorter term opportunities.’”
When there is some clarity on the issue of infrastructure,
“everything up there will boom.” (Richard Nemis – 2010 PDAC
Prospector of the Year Co-Winner)

Award winning mining promoter offers new take on the Ring of Fire

Richard Nemis, the Sudbury-born lawyer turned mining promoter, is back in the ring. Down for the count after relinquishing his post as president of Noront Resources in 2008, Nemis is once again poring over maps, knocking on doors and mobilizing drill rigs to the furthest reaches of Ontario’s Far North.

Nemis has reassembled the team credited with the discovery of Noront’s Eagle’s Nest nickel-PGE deposit in the Ring of Fire, launched two new companies, Rencore Resources Ltd. and Bold Ventures Inc., and raised $10 million from Dundee Corporation to test promising geophysical anomalies west of the currently accepted boundaries of the Ring of Fire.

“Our theory is that the Ring of Fire is a lot bigger and goes a lot further,” possibly extending as far as Thomson, Manitoba, said Nemis. The western extension of the Ring of Fire is interrupted by the Winisk River Provincial Park, a no-go area for mineral exploration, but airborne geophysics commissioned by Rencore has identified 16 potential drill targets in the so-called REN-6 and REN-8 claim groups west of the park.

[NDP mining policy] Job saver or job killer? – by Rachel Punch (Sudbury Star – August 16, 2011)

August 16, 2011

The Sudbury Star, the City of Greater Sudbury’s daily newspaper.

NDP MPP France Gelinas is standing by her party’s plan to keep Ontario’s resources in the province for processing, despite the Liberal claim it would put hundreds of well-paying jobs at risk in Sudbury.

Ontario NDP Leader Andrew Horwath announced earlier this month that if her party is elected in October, it would amend the Mining Act so resources mined in Ontario cannot be exported if they can be processed in Ontario. ” The North’s natural resources should be creating jobs in the North,” Horwath stated.

“Instead of letting companies take our resources and run, we can keep good value-added jobs and industry in northern communities.” Sudbury’s Liberal MPP Rick Bartolucci, however, said Monday the policy would mean job losses for Sudburians.

” This is just a policy that would ensure that other countries would close their borders to Canada and … most immediately would result in the loss of jobs in Sudbury,” he said.

[McGuinty] Biding his time [about Ring of Fire] – by Carol Mulligan

August 15, 2011

The Sudbury Star, the City of Greater Sudbury’s daily newspaper. cmulligan@thesudburystar.com

The Ontario Liberals will wait to see how much money the private sector is willing to invest in infrastructure to develop the Ring of Fire chromite deposits before it puts government money into the area, says the premier.

The province will definitely have to help build infrastructure, such as roads, to bring the project online, but it wants to maximize its opportunities before it does, says Dalton McGuinty.

Any public investment would have to be shown to benefit Ontarians — and especially Northern Ontarians — and that includes businesses and First Nations.

“We’ve got an opportunity to do this in a way that’s never been done before, so we’re excited about that,” McGuinty told reporters at Laurentian University’s J.N. Desmarais Library on Saturday. “But, yes, at some point in time, it will call for an investment in infrastructure.”

He visited Laurentian to address the annual Summer Fling policy conference of Ontario Young Liberals, where he announced an initiative to help new graduates who work in the not-for-profit sector.

Northern Ontario: A Golden Klondike – 192 million ounces of gold and counting – by Stan Sudol

January 21, 2018August 14, 2011

Stan Sudol is a Toronto-based communications consultant and mining columnist. Stan.sudol@republicofmining.com

A much shorter version of this article appears in the September, 2011 issue of the Northern Miner’s Mining Markets: A Resource for Investors magazine.

A fever is spreading throughout northern Ontario, from the eastern districts adjacent Quebec to the far reaches of the northwest right up to the Manitoba border. This raging malaise is caused by a metal that has captured mankind’s attention from the dawn of time. I am referring to “gold fever” and many in northern Ontario – a vast northern territory, which is almost equal to Germany, United Kingdon, Greece and Ireland combined – are thoroughly infected or obsessed over this beautiful precious metal.

Historically, Ontario’s gold mining industry has played a major role in the settlement of the province’s northern regions and along with the Cobalt silver boom and further gold and base metal discoveries in northwestern Quebec were primarily responsible for the establishment of Toronto as today’s mine financing capital of the world.

The many gold mines that came into production during the Depression of the 1930s made a vital contribution to keeping the province solvent and with over a century of experience building many underground mines helped solidify Ontario’s hard-rock mining expertise that is well respected globally.

However, northern Ontario’s gold rushes have always seemed to play second-fiddle to the legendary Klondike in the Yukon, aided by famous writers like Jack London, Robert W. Service – of the Cremation of Sam McGee fame – and Canadian literary icon, Pierre Berton. At it’s peak, the Klondike gold rush only lasted for a few years – 1896-99 – and produced a miserly 12.5 million ounces of gold. “Chump change” compared to northern Ontario’s four major gold rushes and a number of smaller gold districts, most of which are still producing the precious metal today.

Considering the record setting price of gold, moving upwards almost daily, the political stability of northern Ontario and its strong world-class mining infrastructure versus lesser developed countries like Tanzania, Guatemala or Papua New Guinea, exploration in all current and former gold mining camps is booming.

[NDP] Changing the rules [for resourse development in northern Ontario] – (Thunder Bay Chronicle-Journal Editorial – August 10, 2011)

August 14, 2011

The Thunder Bay Chronicle-Journal is the daily newspaper of Northwestern Ontario.

ONTARIO NDP Leader Andrea Horwath is courting northern votes by proposing to protect and create northern jobs. It’s a familiar pledge. Few northerners will argue with her value-added intentions, announced in Thunder Bay Tuesday. But forcing industry’s hand at a time when industry is fond of simply moving to the cheapest jurisdiction goes against all that free trade and globalization, such as they are, strive for. It’s a tide that will be hard to turn.

Horwath says that if an NDP government is elected in October, it will ensure that Ontario’s natural resources stay in Ontario to create value-added forestry and mining jobs and give northern communities and First Nations a chance to share in more of the prosperity the North creates.

Horwath unveiled plans to fix forestry tenure rules to give communities more control over wood allocations. And she would amend the Mining Act so resources mined in Ontario cannot be exported if they can be processed in Ontario.

Gold runs in their veins – by Joe O’Connor (National Post – August 13, 2011)

August 14, 2011August 13, 2011

The National Post is Canada’s second largest national paper.

“By 1930, Canada became the world’s second-largest producer of gold, with
Ontario responsible for most of that output,” Stan Sudol writes in a recent
Canadian Mining Journal article.

It is an awkward moment, and it happens all the time. Jessica Bjorkman will meet a stranger, a new face in town, and if they start talking, and if the conversation winds around to the inevitable career question – ”So, what do you do for a living?” – she will sigh, just a little. See, it is complicated.

Ms. Bjorkman is not a wildeyed old man with a grizzled beard yodelling around the great north woods on the back of a donkey. And she does not live in the Yukon. And she has not memorized all the words to Robert Service’s poem, The Cremation of Sam McGee. So when she tells someone, “I am a prospector,” that someone will invariably shoot her a curious look.

“Most everybody is surprised,” Ms. Bjorkman says. “I say we go out looking for rocks that have potential. We are the step before a mine. Basically, we are the ones out there, on the ground, looking for something promising.”

“The Death of Mining” in 1984 – perhaps Mark Twain said it best

August 12, 2011

This article was provided by the Ontario Mining Association (OMA), an organization that was established in 1920 to represent the mining industry of the province.

Please link here for: Business Week – Death of Mining: December 17, 1984

The cover story on Business Week magazine on December 17, 1984 bore the ominous headline “The Death of Mining.” Twenty seven years later, at the 68th Canadian Mines Ministers Conference held in Alberta, the Canadian Mineral Industry Federation (CMIF) presented evidence of a diametrically opposite point of view.

“Canada’s mining industry is a major contributor to Canadian prosperity – providing $35 billion to GDP in 2010 and based on Natural Resources Canada definitions, employing 308,000 workers in mineral extraction, processing and manufacturing,” said the CMIF submission to mines ministers. “There are more than 3,200 companies, which provide inputs to the industry ranging from engineering services to drilling equipment.”

“The industry pays around $10 billion annually in taxes and royalties to federal, provincial and territorial governments,” it said. “Alberta, Saskatchewan, Newfoundland and Labrador, New Brunswick, Manitoba and British Columbia all typically derive a significant portion of government revenues from the mining industry.”

Back in 1984, Business Week told us “a series of factors accounts for mining’s malaise.