Republic of Mining

Don Mosher: Strangulation by Regulation—Is the Venture Exchange on Its Deathbed? – by Brian Sylvester (The Gold Report – March 25, 2013)

March 26, 2013

http://www.streetwisereports.com/

Don Mosher, a business consultant with B&D Capital in Vancouver, is sounding the alarm. The TSX Venture Exchange, a once-thriving exchange for junior mining companies, is struggling. Its strife is a symptom of the overregulation that is slowly killing a whole sector of the Canadian economy, forcing mining companies and their servicers out of business or to move overseas. But the death knell hasn’t sounded yet, Mosher tells The Gold Report. He believes the Venture Exchange and mining in Canada can be saved, and he outlines his plan here.

The Gold Report: Don, you believe that Canada’s TSX Venture Exchange, where most of the world’s junior mining equities raise cash, is in crisis. Your concern stems from overregulation and market inefficiencies. Can you give us an example to illustrate your point?

Don Mosher: Take a capital pool company or even a junior initial public offering. It might raise from $200,000 ($200K) to $1 million ($1M), but about 40% of that goes to regulators, attorneys and accountants before it even gets a listing. The chances of success are very small when a company has to use that amount of capital right out of the gate, just to get a listing in place.

TGR: If it’s that prohibitive, why are there 1,673 junior mining companies listed on the TSX Venture?

ONTC talks on track – by Benjamin Aubé (Timmins Daily Press – March 26, 2013)

March 26, 2013

The Daily Press is the city of Timmins broadsheet newspaper.

TIMMINS – Just a few minutes out a first meeting regarding the future and privatization of the Ontario Northland Transportation Commission (ONTC), Timmins Mayor Tom Laughren was being optimistic about the talks.

Minister of Northern Development and Mines, Michael Gravelle, met with various industry players and municipal leaders in North Bay on Monday. Talks surrounded on involving the North in the process that has seen the ONTC become available for sale to private investors.

“We had a very open dialogue, he took a lot of questions,” said Laughren about Monday’s discussions with Gravelle. “A lot of people there wanted to know why they’re there and what the fit is.

“We don’t want to meet today, and four months from now find out that something else is happening here. If we’re going to be part of this committee, then this committee has to be one that listens, and there’s got to be some reaction to some of the ideas and suggestions that are being brought up by this advisory group, and he was all good with all of that.”

Since the Liberal government announced plans to privatize the various factions of ONTV service in March 2012, passenger rail service to the North has been discontinued.

Governor says attack hurts image of Congo mining hub – by Bienvenu Bakumanya and Clara Ferreira-Marques (Reuters India – March 25, 2013)

March 26, 2013

http://in.reuters.com/

KINSHASA/LONDON, March 25 (Reuters) – An attack by some 300 rebels on the Democratic Republic of Congo’s second city, Lubumbashi, has tarnished the image of the country’s mining hub but has not interrupted operations, the region’s governor said on Monday.

Lubumbashi and the wider southern province of Katanga have been seen as among the safest in a country riven by armed conflict. Billions of dollars of investment have poured in to tap its copper, cobalt and tin deposits following years of underinvestment.

But the region also has some of Congo’s poorest pockets, and rebel fighters feeding off local grievances and decades-old secessionist sentiment have run increasingly audacious forays outside their heartland in the region’s northeast.

The government said on Sunday around 300 Mai Mai Kata Katanga separatists attacked the city armed mainly with bows and arrows and machetes. It said troops killed about 15 of them while nearly 250 others surrendered.

A witness to Saturday’s attack said the group had attempted to hoist the flag of Katanga’s short-lived 1960s-era independent republic before members of the army’s elite Republican Guard launched a counter-attack.

RPT-INSIGHT-“Triangle of death” looms over Congo’s mining heartlands – by Jonny Hogg and Clara Ferreira-Marques (Reuters India – March 25, 2013)

March 26, 2013

http://in.reuters.com/

LIKASI, Democratic Republic of Congo, Feb 19 (Reuters) – T rucks of workers and building materials hurtle through the mining town of Likasi at the heart of Congo’s copper producing south, evidence of the billions being poured into the region after years of war and underinvestment.

But rebel fighters feeding off local grievances and secessionist sentiment are threatening to resurrect the spectre of a southern breakaway, in a fresh challenge to the stability and integrity of the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The rebels, estimated to number anything from a few hundred to a few thousand, armed with bows, arrows and assault rifles, could re-open decades-old political fissures in Katanga, Congo’s economic engine but also its most independent-minded province.

Their forays south, away from their stronghold in the province’s north and towards Katanga’s mining heart, raise the stakes in a region that is also a power base for a government already stretched by a separate insurgency in the east.

Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) is one of a handful of aid organisations in Katanga operating in the vast and virtually roadless northern area known to locals as the “Triangle of Death” in reference to atrocities including massacres, rape and cannibalism carried out by the rebels, known as the Mai Mai.

NEWS RELEASE: HR strategy to address underground mining in B.C.

March 26, 2013

Economy, Education Saturday, March 23, 2013 10:00 AM

VICTORIA – Additional funding for a human resource strategy that supports skills training for people working in underground mining is now underway between the B.C. government and the BC Mining HR Task Force.

Under the Canada-British Columbia Labour Market Development Agreement (LMDA) Labour Market Partnerships program, government is providing an additional $24,750 to expand the scope of the existing British Columbia Mineral and Mining Industry Human Resource Strategy to include underground mining. The funding will be used to include an underground miner occupational analysis and skills development component.

The project will identify the skill requirements of underground miners, evaluate the current capacity for training underground miners in B.C., and make recommendations to expand skills development programs in the province.

The underground mining strategy augments the British Columbia Mineral and Mining Industry Human Resource Strategy funding in excess of $1 million. The funding is being used to further develop strategies designed to meet the increasing demand for skilled labour in B.C.’s mining sector.

The broad-based strategy currently underway identifies industry-specific training and the educational and promotional needs required to keep pace with a growing industry that is facing a shortage of skilled workers.

NEWS RELEASE: Canadian mining industry asks Quebec government to heed their warning New royalty regime would stall province’s economic growth and industry’s competitiveness

March 26, 2013

OTTAWA, March 25, 2013 – As the Quebec government prepares to table a new mining tax regime this week that would significantly heighten mining taxes and royalties, the Mining Association of Canada (MAC) is warning that a new royalty regime would worsen the province’s investment appeal with detrimental economic effects to Quebec and Canada’s economy as a whole.

It is expected that this new proposed tax regime would put in place two new levies – a five per cent tax on the gross value of annual production, as well as a 30 per cent royalty on “super-profits”. Quebec is already a high tax jurisdiction in many respects, and as recently as 2010, saw the former government raise the taxes on profits to 16 per cent from 12 per cent.

“The new regime would tarnish Quebec’s reputation as a mining-friendly jurisdiction for investment,” said Pierre Gratton, MAC’s President and CEO. “Moreover, from a global mining company standpoint looking to build its next project, I am concerned that there will be little distinction between Quebec and the rest of Canada, thus harming the country’s reputation as a whole.”

Competition for mining investment is fierce on a global scale. Canada competes against other global mining countries that are equally touted for having rich mineral deposits, such as countries in Europe, Latin America and Africa. With so many other countries at play, a mining company will simply overlook Canada for another mining jurisdiction considered more competitive from an investment standpoint.

Media Release: Momentum grows in Timmins for an investigation into Ontario mine safety

March 26, 2013

March 25, 2013

New chapter of MINES (Mining Inquiry Needs Everyone’s Support) established in Timmins and new website revealed: www.mininginquiry.com

(Timmins, March 25, 2013) Wendy and Briana Fram, mother and sister of Jordan Fram who was killed in an underground accident two years ago, led a delegation of seven Sudburians to meet with Timmins citizens equally concerned about the lack of attention being paid to mine safety legislation in Ontario.

The approximately 40 attendees in McIntyre arena heard from the Sudbury MINES delegation that there have been eight mining deaths since 2011 in the province and that the core piece of Ontario mining legislation has not had a major overhaul in 35 years. They also explained that inquest recommendations tied to miners’ deaths do not seem to make a difference or get acted upon.

MINES co-chair Jodi Blassuti also described how changes in the speed, volume and mechanization of mining are at odds with the now outdated legislation.

Speakers from Timmins included friends and relatives of miners killed or injured on the job, MP Charlie Angus and representatives of the United Steelworkers (USW).

Environmental approvals for Ring of Fire mine running into difficulty – by Heather Scoffield (The Canadian Press/Winnipeg Free Press – March 25, 2013)

March 25, 2013

http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/

OTTAWA – Just as the federal government strives to speed up environmental reviews of major mining and energy projects, approvals for the giant Ring of Fire proposal in northern Ontario are getting increasingly tangled.

On Monday, a key environmental group asked for provincial government mediation on how Cliffs Natural Resources plans to develop a giant chromite deposit in the fragile muskeg of the James Bay lowlands.

The Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society says Cleveland-based Cliffs is dramatically changing its plans for a mine without properly consulting with the public.

“Several major alterations have been incorporated at the last minute and without the benefit of public scrutiny,” the Wildlands League chapter of CPAWS says in a letter to Ontario Environment Minister Jim Bradley.

The letter says Cliffs is backing away from a long-term plan to do a combination of open-pit mining and underground mining, opting to stick with only open pit.

It also notes Cliffs is considering only a single route — a north-south road that would be heavily subsidized — to transport chromite ore out of the area, instead of considering other ways such, as an east-west corridor that could link First Nations to much-needed infrastructure.

Could faster mining permitting help fuel future U.S. economic growth? – by Dorothy Kosich (Mineweb.com – March 25, 2013)

March 25, 2013

http://www.mineweb.com/

A bill introduced by Rep. Mark Amodei, R-Nevada, a former Nevada Mining Association president, aims to set timelines on U.S. mining permits and limit citizen lawsuits against projects.

RENO (MINEWEB) – The National Mining Association and its long-time loyal opposition, the environmental NGO Earthworks, recently sparred before a congressional subcommittee as whether the U.S. mining really needs HR 761, The Critical and Strategic Minerals Production Act of 2013.

Hal Quinn, CEO of the National Mining Association, told the House Subcommittee on Energy and Minerals Resources that the measure “addresses a key issue for the country’s future economic growth and manufacturing revival: the painfully slow permitting process for the miners that supply metals and minerals essential for our basic industries, our national defense and the consumer product we use.”

“The value added by major industries that consume the $77 billion of minerals produced in the U.S. was an estimated $2.4 trillion in 2012, or 15% of our GDP,” Quinn noted. “In addition, domestic mining generated $50 billion in tax payments to federal, state and local governments.”

Why gold shares haven’t lost their shine – by Martin Mittelstaedt (Globe and Mail – March 25, 2013)

March 25, 2013

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.

Despite a small uptick last week due to Cyprus jitters, the price of gold has been heading south in fits and starts since hitting a record near $1,900 (U.S.) an ounce back in September, 2011. Gold-mining shares have been just about the worst investment on the stock market, with the TSX global gold index losing about a third of its value over the past two years.

Being a gold bug has clearly become a painful investment thesis and investors are responding accordingly by yanking money from the sector. Holdings in the world’s biggest bullion-backed fund, the SPDR Gold Trust, have recently fallen to their lowest since mid-2011, according to Bloomberg. Big-name investors, such as hedge fund operator George Soros, have been bailing from gold, too.

Amid the despondency, John Hathaway, manager of the $1.8-billion Tocqueville Gold Fund, remains optimistic, arguing that the current downturn is just a pause that will refresh the long-term gold bull market. “If anything, it looks better than ever,” says Mr. Hathaway of the outlook. The negative mood, in his opinion, is “usually what happens before you make a big low.”

A chat with Mr. Hathaway on gold is always worth the effort. He’s considered one of the world’s best gold managers, with his fund’s performance ranking No. 1 over the past five years in the sector, according to Morningstar.

Feds can do better: NAN – by Carl Clutchey (Thunder Bay Chronicle-Journal – March 25, 2013)

March 25, 2013

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

Nishnawbe Aski Nation says it has found little in last week’s federal budget to help First Nations position themselves “to be partners, investors and owners of the significant resource-based economy about to emerge from our treaty territories.”
In a news release following the release of Thursday’s budget, NAN Grand Chief Harvey Yesno said “Canada can do better” in terms of helping NAN communities realize “a long-term vision for prosperity and wealth.”

A post-budget analysis by NAN also found the document to be lacking in terms of addressing ongoing shortages of food, housing and police officers in NAN’s mostly isolated reserves in Ontario’s remote North.

“After reviewing (more than) $700 million worth of federal funding announcements related to First Nations outlined in the budget across many federal departments, the only direct benefit to the 49 First Nations of NAN is the announcement of $4.4 million over three years for Ring of Fire communities,” said the release.

Thunder Bay-based NAN said that while it applauds the $100-million earmarked for Nunavut housing projects, there was nothing for the 32 remote NAN reserves “where housing is limited.”

Xstrata hoping to keep the Kidd deep mine running beyond 2020 – by Len Gilles (Timmins Times – March 22, 2013)

March 25, 2013

http://www.timminstimes.com/

The Xstrata Kidd Mine in Timmins has a life expectancy of perhaps another eight years, but everything is being done to make the mine run as efficiently, as sunstainably and as profitably as possible.

And from that, there is the possibility that maybe, just maybe, another few years of mine life might be found.

That was part of the message Thursday from Xstrata Copper Kidd Operations general manager Tom Semadeni who was the guest speaker at the Timmins Chamber of Commerce luncheon event at the Dante Club.

He said the Kidd mine is still quite large, still quite rich and still expensive to run. The Kidd Mine is not only the deepest mine in Canada, it is the deepest base metal mine in the world at more than 9600 feet down.

Semadeni said that the copper, zinc and silver ore at Kidd is very rich. On the other side of the coin, because the mine is now so deep, everything involved in running the mine is more expensive.

It takes longer for the miners to get from surface down to the work areas. It takes longer to ship equipment and materials from surface to the lower levels. Ventilation and the cost of moving fresh air into the mine and removing stale air and blasting gases is significantly higher. And it takes longer to bring the ore to surface.

Canadian ‘invasion’ of Guatemala’s mines causing conflicts – by Catherine Solyom (Montreal Gazette – March 22, 2013)

March 25, 2013

http://www.montrealgazette.com/index.html

MONTREAL — With her broad, patient smile, her work-worn hands folded over a traditional, woven skirt, Lolita Chavez is hardly a menacing figure. Yet in Guatemala, Chavez has been branded a threat to national security and a terrorist for speaking out against the development of Canadian-owned mines against the people’s will.

In Montreal Friday as part of a cross-country tour to draw attention to ongoing conflicts around mines — called “Plan Nord, Plans Sud” in Quebec — Chavez spoke to a crowded auditorium at UQÀM about her experience and Canadians’ responsibility in the “new invasion” of her country.

First came the Spanish conquest, then the civil war in Guatemala that claimed some 200,000 lives, now come the Canadians, Chavez told the crowd of students, academics and activists.

“Canadian companies are the main protagonists in this invasion that brings only death and destruction,” said Chavez, the spokesperson for 87 indigenous K’iche’ (Mayan) communities in Santa Cruz del Quiché, about 145 kilometres north west of Guatemala City. “And when we say we don’t want it, they say we are ignorant, or brutes, or we don’t understand the benefits. But we have a right to say no.”

Canada’s 2013 Budget a ‘mixed bag’ for miners – MAC – by Henry Lazenby (MiningWeekly.com – March 22, 2013)

March 25, 2013

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

TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – Mining Association of Canada (MAC) on Friday said the new federal Budget for 2013 is a mixed bag when it came to its impacts on the Canadian mining industry.

MAC said it was encouraged by the significant new measures announced to address skills shortages, including the establishment of a Canada Job Grant, support for more paid internships, the reduction of barriers in apprenticeship accreditation, the reallocation of funds to promote education in high-demand fields, and funding for Yukon College’s Centre for Northern Innovation in Mining.

The association added the Canadian mining sector appreciated government’s enhanced Aboriginal training-to-employment programmes and a boost in scholarships and bursaries, which is proportionally the largest private sector employer of Aboriginal peoples in Canada.

MAC also welcomed the government’s proposal to provide $37-million over the next two years to support research partnerships with industry through the granting councils.

“As an industry that will require an estimated 145 000 new workers over the next ten years, we are pleased that skills and labour training emerged as a key theme of the federal budget.

NEWS RELEASE: The Sound of Silence: First Nations Release Oil Spill Commercial Reminding British Columbians of Dangers Oil Tankers

March 25, 2013

March 24, 2013

Released on the 24th anniversary of the Exxon Valdez oil spill, powerful television commercial features oil spill footage and iconic song by Simon & Garfunkel

VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA (March 24, 2013) – The Coastal First Nations today released a television commercial reminding British Columbians of the dangers and costs of bringing oil tankers to BC’s pristine coastal waters.

See the commercial on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1XNwjdI5m_E

“We thought it was appropriate to release the commercial on the 24th anniversary of the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska,” said Art Sterritt, Executive Director of the Coastal First Nations. “The Coastal First Nations have banned oil tankers from our traditional territories in the Great Bear Rainforest, and we have invested more than $300 million dollars over the past decade to establish a sustainable economy on the coast.”