Republic of Mining

Alphonse and Gaston meet the Ring of Fire – by (Troy Media – March 30, 2014)

March 31, 2014

http://www.troymedia.com/

Frank Dabbs is a veteran business and political journalist, author of three biographies and a contributor, researcher or editor of half a dozen books. Frank worked in print, radio and television in Alberta for 40 years. Since 2006, he has been a print and television freelancer in Ontario.

None of the players involved in the development of Ontario’s economic salvation is willing to be the first to commit

ANNAN, ON, Mar 30, 2014/ Troy Media/ – Alphonse and Gaston were two newspaper cartoon characters created in the 1920s by Frederick Opper, and the “glacial” progress of Ontario’s Ring of Fire harks back to them.

Alphonse and Gaston were two waiters who never got anything done because they were too polite. “After you Alphonse,” Gaston said. “No, you first, my dear Gaston,” replied Alphonse.

It’s very reminiscent of what is happening with Ontario’s Ring of Fire, a massive planned chromite mining and smeltering development project in the mineral-rich James Bay Lowlands of Northern Ontario. No one seems willing to be the first to launch the $60 billion mineral discovery in the area.

Mick Davis is cash heavy and hunting for mining deals – maybe in Canada – by Eric Reguly (Globe and Mail – March 31, 2014)

March 31, 2014

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

ROME — The new company set up by Mick Davis and other former Xstrata executives, X2 Resources, has raised $2.5-billion (U.S.) in funds and is set to buy mining assets in the belief that the commodities cycle is set for a revival.

X2 announced Monday that it had secured the commitment from five investors, each of which have contributed $500-million. The same five have have agreed to contribute another $1.25-billion in conditional equity funding, raising the potential total to US$3.75-billion.

The identifies of only two of the five investors, Noble Group and TPG, have been disclosed. Noble Group, based in Hong Kong and listed on the Singapore exchange, is one of the world’s largest commodities trading and infrastructure companies. It competes with Switzerland’s Glencore, the new owner of Xstrata. Mr. Davis was CEO of Xstrata until early last year.

TPG is a private American investment firm, with more than $55-billion in assets under management in a broad range of businesses, from energy to biotechnology.

Ont. ‘on roadway’ to dialogue on resource extraction – by Carol Mulligan (Sudbury Star – March 31, 2014)

March 31, 2014

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

A lawyer, who has represented both companies and First Nations in negotiating impact benefit agreements, says he’s encouraged by the regional framework agreement signed last week by the province and the Matawa chiefs for the Ring of Fire.

Bill Gallagher of Waterloo, an experienced strategist in the area of native, government and corporate relations, who has written a book on the subject, says it wouldn’t have been easy to achieve that outcome.

It would have been a challenge for former Ontario New Democrat premier Bob Rae, who represented the nine Matawa councils, and retired Supreme Court justice Frank Iacobucci, representing the government of Ontario, to reach the deal.

For Rae to get the chiefs working in a cohesive manner would, to some extent, “be like herding cats,” said Gallagher in an interview last week from Winnipeg where he was speaking at a conference along with Rae.

Rae is a lawyer whose clients are giving him instruction, he’s giving them advice and it seems to be working, said Gallagher.

Tunnel vision: Most Canadian CEOs believe the economy must diversify – by Richard Blackwell (Globe and Mail – March 31, 2014)

March 31, 2014

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

Almost two-thirds of Canadian executives say the country is too dependent on resource industries and needs to become more diversified to inject better balance into the economy.

But the latest C-Suite Survey of business executives also shows a deep divide between those in the resource sector and those in other sectors, over the long-standing concentration of Canada’s economic might in mining, oil and gas, and other resources.

Sixty-two per cent of respondents said the downturn in commodities is a reminder that there is too much emphasis on extractive industries, and that there is a need for diversification. About 30 per cent said it makes sense to count on the country’s natural resources – and those executives think the sector will recover as the commodity cycle rebounds.

The results reflect very different views depending on which sector the executives work in. Almost 80 per cent of those in the service industry say Canada is too dependent on resources, while only 44 per cent of executives at the top of mining companies feel that way.

Canada regulator seeks wiretap powers for insider-trading cases – by Cameron French (Reuters U.S. – March 27, 2014)

March 31, 2014

http://www.reuters.com/

(Reuters) – Canada’s largest capital markets regulator is pushing for an amendment to the country’s Criminal Code that would allow investigators to use wiretaps to investigate insider trading.

Such a step would give Canadian investigators a tool that their U.S. counterparts already have, and one that Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) Chairman Howard Wetston said on Thursday is needed to successfully prosecute a crime where proving intent is key.

The OSC is the largest and most influential of Canada’s provincial and territorial securities regulators, and has jurisdiction over the Toronto Stock Exchange. “In my opinion, we are missing a key tool that would assist in more effectively enforcing provisions against insider trading,” he said in a speech to a Toronto business audience.

“Wiretaps would allow us to obtain direct evidence of the intention – I underline intention – to engage in illegal insider trading and tipping,” he said. Tipping refers to the practice of passing along sensitive information that could then be used for trading.

The wiretapping would not be done by the regulator itself, but rather by provincial and federal police that work with regulators to investigate white collar crimes. Wetston said the OSC has been in early-stage talks with police about the issue.

Barrick to revise executive compensation rules – by Rachelle Younglai (Globe and Mail – March 31, 2014)

March 31, 2014

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

Barrick Gold Corp. will unveil pay packages for outgoing chairman Peter Munk and his successor John Thornton, as well as new executive compensation methods, after shareholder uproar over the incoming chair’s signing bonus.

Mr. Thornton’s $11.9-million (U.S.) bonus galvanized the traditionally passive Canadian pension funds to demand changes to how Barrick was governed, triggering the company to overhaul its board of directors late last year.

Barrick’s management proxy circular, to be filed on Monday, will present a new compensation scheme designed to align management’s pay even more closely with the miner’s performance. The company’s plan is expected to require executives to hold their shares until they leave the company.

That would be a departure from the previous arrangements, which allowed management to exercise their stock options at certain dates. “This is coming after they paid Thornton his big bonus. In some respects it’s like shutting the barn door after the horses have left,” said Robert Gill, vice-president and portfolio manager at Lincluden Investment Management, which holds $3.3-billion in assets including Barrick.

Mine safety worth celebrating – by Wayne Snider (Timmins Daily Press – March 28, 2014)

March 31, 2014

The Daily Press is the city of Timmins broadsheet newspaper.

TIMMINS – Mining has a history of being a profession with risks for workers. Much has changed during a century of mining in Timmins. Progress continues to be made to this day, with technology being applied in new and different ways to ensure the safety of the industry’s most valuable resource: Its workers.

But there is more to safety than high-tech solutions. Sometimes it is just passing down a culture of common sense. Stephane Whissel attributes his impressive mine safety record to his upbringing and lessons his father Maurice taught him.

“It’s something that comes with the culture (in which) I was raised,” Whissel explained prior to the Porcupine Northeastern Ontario Mine Safety Group’s annual awards dinner at the Porcupine Dante Club Thursday night. “See, my father was also in mining and I started with him at a young age and I would go out with him.

“He was working out on diamond drills and I would go out in the bush with him. He would show me the proper way of working and going home safe.”

The Mines Have Shut Down. The Miners Haven’t.- by Danny Hakimmarch (New York Times – March 29, 2014)

March 31, 2014

http://www.nytimes.com/

Down a homemade mine shaft in southwestern Poland, a would-be comedian sang in the faint glowing light. The strains of “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da,” in rhythm with a pick ax, rose up from eight yards underground. The song stopped.

“A huge chunk of coal has fallen on my finger!” the miner yelled up the shaft. “Now I can’t pick my nose!”

The sky was black and the stars blazed, especially the constellation Orion. In the nearby city of Walbrzych, the bells had just tolled. It was 9 p.m., the temperature was below freezing, the wind bitter. But for many miners here, in a region known as Lower Silesia, work was just beginning.

The practice of digging coal illegally is often called “rathole mining.” It is better known in places like India, or in South Africa, where illegal mining accidents recently killed five men. But it’s also common in Lower Silesia, near the Czech border.

Poland is Europe’s largest producer of hard coal, and both black and brown coal mines flourish in other parts of the country, from abundant mines in Upper Silesia to the north, to the giant open pit mine in Belchatow, in the east.

The Fight for Wisconsin’s Soul [iron ore mining] – by Dan Kaufman (New York Times – March 29, 2014)

March 31, 2014

http://www.nytimes.com/

WISCONSIN has been an environmental leader since 1910, when the state’s voters approved a constitutional amendment promoting forest and water conservation. Decades later, pioneering local environmentalists like Aldo Leopold and Senator Gaylord Nelson, who founded Earth Day in 1970, helped forge the nation’s ecological conscience.

But now, after the recent passage of a bill that would allow for the construction of what could be the world’s largest open-pit iron ore mine, Wisconsin’s admirable history of environmental stewardship is under attack.

The mine, to be built by Gogebic Taconite (GTac), owned by the coal magnate Chris Cline, would be in the Penokee Hills, in the state’s far north — part of a vast, water-rich ecosystem that President John F. Kennedy described in 1963, in a speech he delivered in the area, as “a central and significant portion of the freshwater assets of this country.”

The $1.5 billion mine would initially be close to four miles long, up to a half-mile wide and nearly 1,000 feet deep, but it could be extended as long as 21 miles. In its footprint lie the headwaters of the Bad River, which flows into Lake Superior, the largest freshwater lake in the world and by far the cleanest of the Great Lakes. Six miles downstream from the site is the reservation of the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, whose livelihood is threatened by the mine.

Raoghat mines in Bastar: Iron in their souls – by Paramita Ghosh (Hindustan Times – March 29, 2014)

March 31, 2014

http://www.hindustantimes.com/

Hills can be unkind, if you are climbing them, or even if you are trying to save them. They have no properly marked-out roads, the clock here is meaningless, but there is shade, and the trees here are everything. The trees point to the sky like compasses; they pelt down flowers, sour-sweet fruits; their leaves are eaten by cows and men; they house the gods, and gods here are like relatives – so why can’t the people keep them?

The nearby Bhilai Steel Plant (BSP) iron-ore mine had led to massive deforestation in Dalli-Rajhara, destroyed fields of grain and corn, led to land seizure, so would its mine at Raoghat be any different? For over 10 years, Badri Gawde, 38, a social worker from Antagarh, a tribal-dominated no-frills town, 20 km from the Raoghat hills and 80 from Kanker city, had been asking himself this question. Lately, he had begun to ask it a little more insistently, holding public meetings, facilitating study trips for academics, tying-up with Chhattisgarh’s unruly bunch, the mine workers, and the state’s two-bit village officials, the sarpanches, and thinking himself up into a leader. Why not say he was a Maoist? And they did.

Gawde’s political pedigree is mixed. Ever since January 24, 2014, when he was picked up at Antagarh, and held in Raipur’s Central Jail under the draconian Public Security Act, he has become, like Lalgarh’s Chhattradhar Mahato, nobody’s man. Naresh Thakur, a Kanker Congress leader, admits Gawde was “with the party”, the state Congress chief, Bhupesh Baghel, said he was a BJP man.

Hotelier looks to drum up interest in mining history – by Ian Ross (Northern Ontario Business – March 5, 2014)

March 28, 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. Ian Ross is the editor of Northern Ontario Business ianross@nob.on.ca.

A Haileybury hotelier and tourism promoter wants to revive the area’s rich mining history and introduce it to a wider audience.

Nicole Guertin, co-owner of Presidential Suites, is hosting a media familiarization tour in early May designed to spark interest in the famed Cobalt mining camp and its impact in today’s Canadian mining industry.

While the Yukon has its lore of the Klondike, Guertin said the story of Cobalt and its place in Canadian history needs to be told. “Being in the middle of this Abitibi-Timmins-Sudbury triangle, we haven’t really sold the area that much for mining.”

Since permanently settling in the Temiskaming area three years ago, Guertin and her partner, Jocelyn Blais, have purchased, renovated and rent out five historical homes in Haileybury.

Their most recent acquisition is a home they’ve dubbed Prospectors’ House, refurbished to highlight the history of the 1903 Silver Rush in Cobalt. Interior decorator Renelle Laliberte of Toronto decorated the four-storey home with a rustic theme in keeping with local mining history, and it features several original works by local artists.

It Is Staggering How Much Australia’s Mining Boom Has Changed Perth And Its People – by Chris Pash (Business Insider Australia March 28, 2014)

March 28, 2014

http://www.businessinsider.com/

Imagine this horror: your child has just reached dating age, and their first crush is on the son or daughter of someone you went out with in your youth, a relationship that ended disastrously.

It was once a common story in Perth, Western Australia, but less so now as the state continues to grow faster than any other in Australia, in both population and its economy.

That comfortable big-country-town feeling is fading, as fast as the red dust of the North West is being shifted to get at the valuable minerals beneath it.

The mining boom of the last decade has done many things for the state and for Australia, most notably being the economic factor that stopped Australia dipping into negative economic growth during the Global Financial Crisis. China is the biggest recipient of Australia’s exports. About half those exports are iron ore from Western Australia. Ten years ago, it was only 16%.

Back in the 1970s, about 1 million tonnes of iron ore was being shoveled from the ground each week. Now it’s about 1.5 million tonnes a day. Visitors from the east say the same things. “Great place, beautiful beaches, bloody expensive. You won’t believe what I paid for bacon and eggs. And the coffee at $5 is rubbish.”

China’s steel meltdown will ripple around the world – by Carl Mortished (Globe and Mail – March 27, 2014)

March 28, 2014

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

LONDON — There’s too much mining, and too much iron ore. Overproduction will take the price of steel’s raw material down by almost a third over the next few years, says Australia’s official forecaster. A supply glut could be just part of the problem, because a swathe of Chinese steel makers are burdened with too much debt – and Beijing is not keen on bailouts.

Australia’s iron triumvirate – Rio Tinto Group, BHP Billiton Ltd. and Fortescue Metals Group Ltd. – are ramping up production, and chasing market share at the expense of prices. The frenzied digging means that the country’s exports of ore are expected to rise by almost a fifth to 680 million tonnes this year.

Australia’s Bureau of Resource and Energy Economics is predicting that by 2019, the iron ore price will fall from last year’s average of $126 (U.S.) per tonne to $87.

The price has already declined by a fifth since the beginning of this year, moving close to $100 per tonne, amid concerns that China’s export engine is slowing.

Coal Mines Face ‘Crunch Time’ as ARMS Mulls Closing Mine – by Jesse Riseborough (Bloomberg News – March 28, 2014)

March 28, 2014

http://www.businessweek.com/

A slump in coal prices to a four-year low means the biggest producers are facing tough decisions to shutter unprofitable mines, Asia Resource Minerals Plc (ARMS) Chief Executive Officer Nick von Schirnding said.

His company, Indonesia’s fifth-biggest exporter of the power-station fuel, is considering closing its largest pit where almost half its production last year was sourced. The world’s biggest exporters, Glencore Xstrata Plc, Rio Tinto Group and BHP Billiton Ltd., have either halted coal operations or shelved expansion plans amid the price decline.

“This is crunch time for our business and the coal industry,” Von Schirnding said today. “Our most challenged pit is Lati, and that we are looking at very, very carefully. Clearly if thermal-coal prices continue at this level for a significant time, we are, as others are, going to be very challenged.”

Prices last week dropped to about $73 a metric ton, the lowest since November 2009, amid a supply glut that’s projected by UBS AG to be the equivalent of 4 percent of annual seaborne trade this year. Asia Resource Minerals today reported a wider full-year underlying loss of $173 million after selling coal for 16 percent less than in 2012.