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KWG V-P blames province for stalling Ring of Fire development – by Jonathan Migneault (Northern Ontario Business – April 4, 2014)

Established in 1980, Northern Ontario Business provides Canadians and international investors with relevant, current and insightful editorial content and business news information about Ontario’s vibrant and resource-rich North.

The province was “blinded” by Cliffs Natural Resources’ promises to invest in the Ring of Fire to the detriment of the project’s development, said Moe Lavigne, KWG Resources’ vice-president of exploration and development.

“At least from the provincial point of view, they were enamoured with Cliffs, and the fact Cliffs had $3.5 billion in their pockets ready to invest, and they shuttered out everything else,” Lavigne said at a Sudbury Chamber of Commerce event, April 3. “Now that has blown up.”

In 2009, the Toronto-based junior miner began staking mining claims in the Ring of Fire for a future railroad from its isolated Big Daddy chromite deposit in the James Bay lowlands, heading south for 328 kilometres to a point on the Canadian National Railway’s main line, just west of the village of Nakina in northwestern Ontario.

Both KWG and the Ohio mining giant were development partners in the Ring at one time, but had a falling out. Later, when Cliffs approached KWG to gain access to its transportation corridor, KWG refused and the matter went to the Ontario Mining and Lands Commissioner.

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Time to make Canada free of conflict minerals – by Paul Dewar (Toronto Star – April 03 2014)

The Toronto Star has the largest circulation in Canada. The paper has an enormous impact on federal and Ontario politics as well as shaping public opinion.

Paul Dewar, New Democratic Party MP for Ottawa Centre riding, is the Official Opposition’s Foreign Affairs critic.

Today (Thursday, April 3) the House of Commons is to begin debating my bill C-486, the Conflict Minerals Act.
The illegal trade of conflict mineral from the Democratic Republic of the Congo and other parts of central Africa has been funding and fueling the deadliest war since the Second World War. The Conflict Minerals Act is a significant and proactive step toward ending the trade of conflict minerals and eventually ending the war.

The scale of the crimes in the Congo, and the connection between consumers and the conflict, is shocking. More than five million people have been killed. Rape is used as a weapon of war – with an estimated 48 women raped every hour. In 2012, there were 2.2 million people displaced and driven away from their homes.

Bill C-486 is part of an international trend to end the trade in conflict minerals and improve consumer awareness of product supply chains. The aim is to cut off the financial resources that sustain the horrors of war in the Congo. 

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NEWS RELEASE: Mining weeks — and days — help recognize and celebrate industry contributions

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.

Mining brings a lot to the society and economy of Ontario. The Ontario Mining Association’s website www.oma.on.ca contains a number of studies which illustrate the industry’s contribution to direct and indirect employment, transportation networks and other vital infrastructure, high tech investment in Research & Development, taxes provided, balance of trade support, communications and community development.

To help remind us all about the vital role of mining and its importance, several communities across the province hold Mining Week, or Mining Day, activities to focus on those contributions. By way of example, a strictly non-exhaustive sample of some of these events follow.

In Timmins, members of the local mining community have declared May 24 to 30, 2014 as Mining Week. During that period Northern Mines Expo is being held May 28 and 29 at the McIntyre Community Centre. Also, on Saturday, May 24, Timmins Square will be the focal point for a number of mineral related activities and displays.

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News Release: Transforming the Ontario Northland Transportation Commission

Ontario Investing in Northeastern Transportation Services and Infrastructure

April 4, 2014 11:07 a.m.Ministry of Northern Development and Mines

Ontario will continue to operate the motor coach, Polar Bear Express, rail freight, and refurbishment services of the Ontario Northland Transportation Commission (ONTC) as a government-owned transportation company.

The province will make new strategic investments to ensure ONTC’s transportation services and infrastructure continue to support economic growth in northeastern Ontario.

The investments include more than $23 million over three years, subject to annual budget approvals, to purchase new motor coaches for its bus line and to refurbish rail coaches for the Polar Bear Express. This will maintain and improve vital transportation services, and provide new work for the ONTC refurbishment division.

Ontario has also reached an agreement with Bell Aliant to purchase Ontera. Proceeds from the sale include $6 million in cash and will result in long-term revenue to ONTC estimated at $10 million. The province and Bell Aliant will each commit $15.1 million as part of a $30.2 million public-private investment in telecommunications infrastructure in northeastern Ontario.

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How Quebec politicians are piggybacking on the battle for Osisko Mining – by Nicolas Van Praet (National Post – April 4, 2014)

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

MONTREAL – Business and politics mix freely in Quebec, sometimes in dangerous ways.

So when Yamana Gold Inc. announced early Wednesday it had struck a friendly deal to buy half of Montreal-based Osisko Mining Corp.’s mining and exploration assets while maintaining Osisko’s head office, it didn’t take long for provincial politicians to react. We are in an election campaign after all and in the eyes of some, there are points to be scored piggybacking on the affairs of private enterprise.

The governing Parti Québécois, eager to cast itself as the best defender of made-in-Quebec businesses, quickly called a press conference to discuss the transaction.

“This is very good news for Quebec’s mining industry,” declared natural resources minister Martine Ouellet, noting the partnership will split assets including Osisko’s flagship Canadian Malartic gold mine in the Abitibi region of Quebec. Finance Minister Nicolas Marceau focused on the role of the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec in the deal, saying the pension fund’s presence as a financial backer ensures Osisko will remain an independent publicly traded company.

For its part, Quebec’s Liberal Party, which is set to take power April 7 according to the latest poll, has insisted it wants any deal for Osisko to be a friendly one.

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Ghost towns haunt S.Africa’s strike-hit platinum belt – by Zandi Shabalala and John Mkhize (Reuters India – April 4, 2014)

http://in.reuters.com/

MARIKANA, South Africa, April 4 (Reuters) – Shad Mohammed’s electronics and household store in South Africa’s platinum belt has survived a series of mining strikes over the 14 years it has been serving customers in the dusty town of Marikana.

Yet with the latest stoppage now in its 10th week, he has sold just 10 phones instead of well over 100, and has had to branch out into deliveries to avoid giving up and going home to Pakistan, another statistic in a devastating industrial dispute. “Our business is totally dependent on the mine workers,” Mohammed, 38, said among shelves filled with cell phones, laptops and large pots. “If they don’t work we really suffer.”

Members of the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (AMCU) have downed tools at Lonmin, the main employer in the tough town of Marikana, and rivals Anglo American Platinum and Impala Platinum in a strike over wages, hitting 40 percent of global production.

The stoppage shows no sides of ending with the two sides still poles apart. AMCU wants a basic-entry level wage in three years of 12,500 rand ($1,200) a month, or annual hikes of around 30 percent, while the companies have offered increases of up to 9 percent and say they can afford no more.

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Mine review: Workplace mental health stressed- by Carol Mulligan (Sudbury Star – April 4, 2014)

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

If Tammy Eger could start work on a research project tomorrow to improve mine safety, it would be on mental health in the workplace.

A researcher at Laurentian University’s Centre for Research in Occupational Health and Safety, Eger gave one of seven presentations to the advisory group for the Ontario Mining Health, Safety and Prevention Review.

The last of three public consultations to the group was held Thursday afternoon in a small, crowded room in the basement of the main branch of Greater Sudbury Public Library.

The mining review was announced late last year by the Ministry of Labour after a push by Sudbury labour groups for a public inquiry into mine safety in Ontario. That call came after an investigation into the June 2011 deaths of Jason Chenier and Jordan Fram at Vale’s Stobie Mine.

Eger told the group that good mental health in workplaces is “absolutely critical” to work safety, and being productive and healthy on the job.

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Ring of Fire: Rail, natural gas power KWG plan – by Carol Mulligan (Sudbury Star – April 4, 2014)

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

Maurice Lavigne’s obligation, as a mine developer, is to optimize economic stability. And that’s what the vice-president of exploration and development with KWG Resources Inc. says his company will do with its plans to build a railroad and process chromite ore with natural gas from its holdings in the Ring of Fire.

You have to keep your costs low with any project, let alone a project on this scale, Lavigne said in Sudbury on Thursday. A “railroad drives down your cost, the gas drives down your costs,” Lavigne told reporters after speaking to a noon crowd at a luncheon held by the Greater Sudbury Chamber of Commerce.

“We’re going to make this project economically robust and we owe that to society.” Lavigne said KWG doesn’t want to build a fragile industry that “shuts down one year and opens the next year and creates chaos in the communities.

“You’ve seen that, you know that movie, we don’t want to do that,” he said. Nor does his company want to go to government and taxpayers looking for subsidies to electricity rates, he said. Lavigne said he came to Sudbury, at the invitation of the chamber, knowing he was coming to “Cliffs-friendly territory.”

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Feds reach $5.15B settlement over [Arizona] mining cleanup – by FELICIA FONSECA, ERIC TUCKER and DINA CAPPIELLO (Associated Press – April 04, 2014)

http://www.kltv.com/

FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. (AP) – For decades, uranium ore was mined from the Lukachukai Mountains of northeastern Arizona, providing Navajos with much-needed employment but leaving behind a legacy of death and disease on the reservation.

Uranium waste was thrown over the mountainside and carried by rain across the remote but scenic land used by hikers, anglers, medicine men and Navajo shepherds. The roughly 50 mine sites were eventually abandoned without cleaning up the contaminated waste.

The Navajo Nation now has its best chance yet to address what has been a source of heartache for families. The federal government announced Thursday that it reached a $5.15 billion settlement with Anadarko Petroleum Corp. for the cleanup of thousands of long-contaminated sites nationwide. About $1 billion will go to the 50 sites on the country’s largest American Indian reservation.

The settlement that resolves a legal battle over Tronox Inc., a spinoff of Kerr-McGee Corp., is the largest ever for environmental contamination. The bulk of the money – $4.4 billion – will pay for environmental cleanup and be used to settle claims stemming from the legacy contamination. Anadarko acquired Tronox in 2006.

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South Africa’s PIC Says Platinum Producers Should Control Prices – by Franz Wild and Janice Kew (Bloomberg News – April 3, 2014)

http://www.bloomberg.com/

South African platinum producers, which account for almost three quarters of world supply, should consider controlling output to improve prices, said the head of Africa’s biggest fund manager.

Anglo American Platinum Ltd. (AMS), known as Amplats, Impala Platinum Holdings Ltd. (IMP) and Lonmin Plc (LMI), the world’s largest producers of the metal, need prices to climb to offset rising costs in an industry already beset by a “concerning” 11-week wage strike, said Elias Masilela, 49, the chief executive officer of the Pretoria-based Public Investment Corp., which manages 1.6 trillion rand ($150 billion) of South African government workers’ pensions.

“They may, as an industry, want to think about supply-demand conditions globally to influence the price,” Masilela, 49, said in an April 1 interview in Johannesburg. “South Africa is a major supplier of platinum, but remains a price-taker. There must be a way of balancing that out given it’s size.”

Masilela’s comments echo those by the governments of South Africa and Russia, which together hold about 80 percent of platinum group metal reserves. The countries plan to set up a production bloc resembling the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, a cartel of the biggest oil-producing countries, they said in March last year.

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Clarke Inc proposes three Sherritt board nominees – by Henry Lazenby (MiningWeekly.com – April 3, 2014)

http://www.miningweekly.com/page/americas-home

TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – In its attempt to shake up the board of diversified miner Sherritt International, Halifax-based investment firm Clarke Inc on Thursday named its three nominees for election to the Sherritt board at the Toronto-based mining company’s annual and special meeting on May 6.

Under the leadership of Clarke president and CEO George Armoyan, a group of concerned shareholders nominated Armoyan, resource advisory and investment business Astor Group CEO Ashwath Mehra and 30-year accounting and international business veteran and Municipal Group of Companies VP of finance and CFO David Wood for election to the Sherritt board.

In a statement published on Thursday, the concerned shareholders sought to ensure that Sherritt’s board acted on behalf of all shareholders and increased its focus on creating shareholder value.

“Directors should share in the risks and the rewards alongside the shareholders of Sherritt. We believe a primary cause of Sherritt’s dismal performance is that the board has no incentive to improve the return to shareholders. “The directors are not significant investors but are exceptionally well paid, no matter how the company or its shares perform. Sherritt belongs to its shareholders. Together, we can regain the value lost,” Armoyan said.

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Strategic metal mining set to gain traction in Britain – by Harpreet Bhal (Reuters U.S. – April 2, 2014)

http://www.reuters.com/

LONDON, April 2 (Reuters) – Mining firms are looking favourably at Britain as a project destination with deposits of strategic metals leading a small mining revival following the launch of the country’s first new metal mine in 45 years.

The UK has deposits of metals such as tin – used in mobile phones, and tungsten – used to make drilling tools – as well as antimony and tellurium – used in the semiconductor industry – seen as having bullish long-term price outlooks as the appetite for electronic gadgets expands in the developing world.

The southwest counties of Cornwall and Devon experienced extensive mining in the 19th century when metals including copper, lead and tin were keenly sought, but fierce competition from lower cost operations in Latin America, Asia and Africa resulted in projects being shut and many sites abandoned.

While analysts said it is unlikely for Britain to experience another mining boom, the country is being eyed by some as a favourable destination due to competitive labour costs and tax rates, as well as deposits of strategic metals – a vital component in technology and industry.

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Kennecott Corporation History: 1915-1997 – by International Directory of Company Histories

http://www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/a/

Company History:

Kennecott Corporation, the world’s leader in copper output throughout most of the 20th century, had by 1997 ceased to exist as a separate entity. That year it was divided into a group of wholly owned subsidiaries of the British metals and mining company Rio Tinto plc. Rio Tinto, formed by the 1995 merger of Kennecott’s owner RTZ Corporation and CRA Limited, continued to operate Kennecott’s chief U.S. businesses: Kennecott Utah Copper, Kennecott Minerals, and Kennecott Energy. However, these operations were absorbed into Rio Tinto’s copper and energy units. The RTZ-CRA merger, pulling in all of Kennecott’s holdings, made Rio Tinto an international giant in the mining and minerals industry.

Origins in the Alaskan Wilderness

The chain of events that would lead to Kennecott’s founding began in 1901. With financial backing from the Havemeyer family, a young mining engineer named Stephen Birch acquired mining rights on a sizeable chunk of promising copper property near the Kennicott Glacier in Alaska (the difference in spelling between the glacier and the company was the result of a clerical mistake). Birch returned East to seek additional investors in the venture, and was introduced by the Havemeyers to J. P. Morgan and to members of the Guggenheim family the following year.

At that time, the Guggenheims were the most powerful force in the industry, controlling the vast majority of copper reserves and nearly all of the smelting capacity in the western United States. These two financial giants formed the Kennecott Mines Company to develop mining operations on the claims purchased from Birch, and Birch was named general manager of the organization.

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Despite Slowdown in China, Rio Tinto Stays Committed to Mining Plans – by Stanley Reed (New York Times – April 3, 2014)

http://www.nytimes.com/

LONDON — Rio Tinto, one of the world’s largest mining companies, has big plans for pulling even more iron ore from the earth.

It is spending billions of dollars to expand its existing operations in the Pilbara region of Western Australia, where driverless trucks the size of three-story buildings haul iron ore out of 15 mines. The trouble is, the buildup comes just as Rio Tinto’s single biggest customer, China, is losing economic steam and global demand for raw materials like iron ore and copper has been cooling.

On a single day in early March, the spot market price of iron ore — the main ingredient in steel — fell by more than 8 percent, and it is down 12 percent for the year. The price of copper, another essential raw material for industry, has recently hovered near four-year lows.

Though mining executives tend to take the long view of their markets, where price cycles are part of the game, some analysts say that this time the industry may be staring at a deeper set of problems from which miners like Rio Tinto could have trouble extracting themselves. Even as China’s decades-old appetite for steel may be abating, there is a potential iron-ore glut coming because so many mining companies increased production to chase prices that for years were alluringly high.

The stock fell by 13 percent from mid-February to mid-March and since then has regained only about half that ground, even as broader indexes have been on the rise.

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Copper price soars on Chile – by Dow Jones Newswires (The Australian – April 3, 2014)

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/

Copper prices soared before paring early gains to end only slightly higher Wednesday on news of a powerful earthquake off the coast of Chile, as most mining operations appeared to be unaffected.

Copper prices had a roller-coaster reaction to the news over the course of the global day. The 8.2-magnitude quake near Chile, the world’s largest producer of the metal, initially pushed up the three-month copper contract on the London Metal Exchange by more than 1 per cent to $6,728.75 a metric tonne.

The price quickly reversed before spiking again later in the day, as US traders began work, to $US6,734 a tonne, the highest since March 10. LME three-month copper closed the day at $6,680 a tonne, up 0.3 per cent from the previous day’s closing price.

In the US, the most actively traded contract, copper for May delivery, rose as high as $3.0740 a pound before closing up 1.1 cents, or 0.4 per cent, at $3.0455 a pound on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange. Aluminium prices tracked copper, rising 1.5 per cent on the day to $1,823 a tonne.

“Concerns about China’s economic outlook overwhelmed short-lived fears of supply disruptions following the earthquake,” said analysts at RBC Capital Markets in a note to clients.

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