Republic of Mining

Northern challenge: NWT prosperity depends on rebuilding investor confidence, miners warn – by Greg Klein (Resource Clips – November 8, 2019)

November 19, 2019

What happens when a mining-based economy runs out of mines? The Northwest Territories risks finding out the hard way but the reason won’t be a lack of mineral resources. For too long, investors have been discouraged from backing territorial exploration.

That’s the message the NWT and Nunavut Chamber of Mines delivered to the legislative assembly in Yellowknife last month. Now the industry group awaits a response, one backed with action, as the newly elected government prepares for its four-year term.

The territory’s three mines, all diamond operations, have passed peak production, facing closures over the coming decade. The NWT hosts only a few advanced projects, none comparing in potential economic clout with the big three. The problem contrasts with the NWT’s two northern neighbours, where the industry continues to thrive.

Manitoba mining could see a billion-dollar boost – by Martin Cash (Winnipeg Free Press – November 19, 2019)

November 19, 2019

https://www.winnipegfreepress.com/

There has not been much good news in the mining industry in Manitoba for a few years, but that’s starting to change, potentially in a very big way.

Vale is on the verge of making what would be the largest single investment in the mining industry in Manitoba’s history at its Thompson operations.

This week’s provincial mining exploration conference led off with the blockbuster news that the Brazilian company is in the final stages of confirming $1 billion of new investment in its Thompson operations over the next five years.

Canada’s worst violent crime problem is in Thompson, Man. – by Shannon VanRaes (MACLEAN’S Magazine – November 19, 2019)

November 19, 2019

https://www.macleans.ca/

As the “Hub of the North” Thompson serves a regional population
of 55,000. The city’s airport is the second busiest in the province
and more than 40 remote communities—mostly First Nations and
Northern Affairs settlements—rely on Thompson for essential
services and commerce.

It’s the “machete kids” that worry Donnel Jonsson most. The property manager for Ashberry Place, a low-income apartment complex in Thompson, Man., has dealt with assaults, fires and even murder over the years. However, recent youth crime has him feeling unsafe, particularly along the city’s Spirit Way trail.

“Kids are going around and assaulting individuals walking the path, no reason why, they just come up to them and basically stab them or cut them across the face,” he says, pointing to a wooded section of trail below a 10-storey-high wolf mural.

This May, the city’s RCMP detachment indeed found itself investigating a stabbing spree that left five injured. In March, a machete-wielding home invader hacked a dog to death and in June, Thompson saw two stabbings and a machete attack in three days.

Burkina Faso: A terrorist gold mine – by Philipp Sandner (Deutsche Welle – November 17, 2019)

November 19, 2019

https://www.dw.com/en/

Gold mines in isolated areas of Africa’s Sahel region have become a welcome source of income for terrorists. Recent attacks in Burkina Faso show that security forces in the region are unable to gain the upper hand.

There is a gold rush in Africa’s Sahel region. A number of new mines have been opened there since a vein of gold was discovered in 2012. The Boungou mine in northeastern Burkina Faso, for instance, was opened between 2017 and mid-2018. But the region is also increasingly under threat from Islamists. Last week, at least 39 people were killed in attacks on buses carrying workers to Boungou; another 60 were injured.

Guiro Abdoul Kader was asleep when the attack occurred: “I was sleeping when I heard one of the windows shatter, at the same time I got a bullet in my back and I fell down. My colleague was next to me and he also lay down and he was on top of me.

I told him he didn’t have any cover and that he should come further down. He said he was hit. He told me to do what I could and that he would stay a little higher up and that we were going to pray to God,” as Kader told Reuters news agency.

First Nations near proposed Sask. diamond mine cautiously optimistic about future (CBC News Saskatoon – November 18, 2019)

November 19, 2019

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatoon/

Mining giant Rio Tinto announced plans to exercise options in Star-Orion South Project, buy majority stake

Three First Nations in central Saskatchewan say they’ve begun informal talks with a large multinational mining company planning a large diamond mine project in the area.

On Friday, Rio Tinto Exploration Canada (RTEC) gave notice it would be exercising its options to enter into a joint venture agreement with the project’s current owner on the Star Orion South diamond project. If successful, the move would eventually leave Rio Tinto with a majority stake.

The potential change in ownership would be welcome, according to the James Smith Cree Nation. For years, the First Nation has been battling with the mine’s current owner, Star Diamond Corporation (formerly Shore Gold).

Copper, cobalt miners urged to do more to fight DRC corruption, child labour practices – by David McKay (MiningMX.com – November 18, 2019)

November 19, 2019

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COMPANIES mining copper and cobalt in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) have been urged to do more to fight corruption and child labour, said Bloomberg News citing a report by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD).

Companies should be “proactive about addressing risks, for example by improving working conditions in artisanal mining or taking action to address corruption in their supply chains,” Ben Katz, co-author of the OECD report, said in a statement.

Citing the US Geological Survey, the newswire said the DRC was the world’s largest cobalt producer and the fifth largest producer of copper. As demand for the two minerals has soared with the growth of the electronic and electric-vehicle industries, so have worries about the conditions under which they are mined, it said.

India looks to relax norms to attract global coal miners, industry skeptical – by Sudarshan Varadhan and Melanie Burton (Reuters U.S. – November 18, 2019)

November 19, 2019

https://www.reuters.com/

NEW DELHI/MELBOURNE (Reuters) – India is looking to lower advance payments and offer larger mining blocks to attract global companies to invest in its coal sector for the first time, but industry sources say the measures may not be enough to draw in big international miners.

India plans to float global tenders for the first time for coal mining blocks before end-2019, sources familiar with the matter told Reuters in August, a move that could end Coal India Ltd’s <COAL .NS> near-monopoly on the fuel.

The auctions, to be aimed at paring back the nation’s coal imports, are intended to attract global miners such as Glencore PLC, BHP Group, Anglo American PLC and Peabody Energy Corp.

Quebec is as much an oil state as Alberta — they just let others produce it – by Monte Solberg (Financial Post – November 19, 2019)

November 19, 2019

https://business.financialpost.com/

Monte Solberg, the principal at New West Public Affairs, is a former Alberta MP and cabinet minister

Take my hand, will you, and I will lead you through the wardrobe to a magical place, where the only energy is clean energy, where Tesla-driving Quebecers signal as they change lanes, and the only emissions are of a private nature.

Now, as we walk through a pristine old-growth forest we come upon a great eminence, a splendid figure who picks absent-mindedly at a glorious cape made entirely of recycled plastic straws. What is this place and who is this extraordinary man?

It is Imaginary Quebec of course, home to Yves-François Blanchet, leader of the Bloc Québécois. Here, he speaks for all of Quebec. Here he has declared that he will not help Alberta “create an oil state,” suggesting that the Quebec economy isn’t itself greased and fired by decayed dinosaurs.

Barrick Gold sells half of Kalgoorlie Consolidated Gold Mines for $750 million – by Valentina Ruiz Leotaud (Mining.com – November 17, 2019)

November 19, 2019

https://www.mining.com/

Canada’s Barrick Gold (TSX:ABX)(NYSE:GOLD), the world’s second largest producer of the yellow metal, reached an agreement to sell its 50% interest in Kalgoorlie Consolidated Gold Mines in Western Australia to Saracen Mineral Holdings (ASX:SAR).

Saracen already holds two gold operations in the Kalgoorlie region, namely, the Carosue Dam and the Thunderbox mine sites.

In a media statement, Barrick said the KCGM transaction involved the payment of $750 million in cash and that such funds will be used to further strengthen the company’s balance sheet, invest in future projects and deliver returns to its shareholders.

Alberta is facing a full-blown economic crisis and it needs support, not condescension – by Martin Pelletier (Financial Post – November 19, 2019)

November 19, 2019

https://business.financialpost.com/

Alberta’s billions in transfer payments have helped other provinces hurt by economic troubles, so where’s the compassion for the province now?

Western Canada is currently facing uncertain times not witnessed since the Petro-Canada Centre, better known as Red Square, was built to house the then Crown Corporation in downtown Calgary in 1983. And with no resolution in sight for the five-year-long rout in oil and natural gas prices, things are going to get a lot worse before they get better.

While Encana’s decision to move its headquarters to Denver made headlines, the reality is that business are leaving the province in droves. One local realtor, Robert Graham at Arrowstar, told Global News recently that Arrowstar alone has helped 100 Western Canadian companies relocate to the Houston area, 40 of those in the past year and a half.

Others are shutting up shop completely, or closing locations in the province: Chili’s shut all but three of its Alberta locations in 2017; Red Robin has plans to pull out of Alberta by year-end; and Starbucks has announced numerous closures in both Edmonton and Calgary. That on top of the multitude of mom-and-pop businesses that are simply going bust.

Proposed standards for mining waste dams draw concerns from industry trade group – by Ernest Scheyder (Reuters U.S. – November 18, 2019)

November 19, 2019

https://www.reuters.com/

VANCOUVER (Reuters) – The world’s largest mining trade group said on Monday it has concerns with global standards for mining waste dams being crafted by an independent panel of academics and engineers, especially how the new rules will apply equally to new and existing facilities.

The public lobbying of an ostensibly neutral process is likely to rankle environmentalists, indigenous groups and others who have long demanded miners do more to bolster safety at tailings dams, which are used to store the muddy detritus of the mining process and can be dozens of meters high.

Public trust in the industry has plunged since a Brazil tailings dam owned by Vale SA collapsed last January, killing hundreds.

OPINION: Northern Manitoba offers rich potential – by Doug Lauvstad (Winnipeg Free Press – November 18, 2019)

November 18, 2019

https://www.winnipegfreepress.com/

Doug Lauvstad is president of University College of the North, which offers programming in 14 locations throughout Manitoba.

Northern Manitoba remains an enigma in the context of economic development. It is a region blessed with abundant natural endowments including a seaport, strong public-sector support systems, and an imperative on the part of all people and governments to create economic and community well-being.

It’s also a region separated by differing cultures and realities: larger, high-wage centres built around resource extraction versus small, often remote Indigenous communities with a traditional lifestyle removed from the economic mainstream.

Amid this dichotomy, northern Manitoba has the foundations for incredible wealth creation from industries such as mining, forestry, energy and tourism, which contribute and could continue to contribute billions of dollars to the Manitoba economy.

The Mining Industry Could Strike Gold With Automation – by Charles Towers-Clark (Forbes Magazine – October 31, 2019)

November 18, 2019

https://www.forbes.com/

The mining industry is facing a tough decision. A staunchly traditional industry, mining is now at a critical juncture in which it will either adopt new technologies or be left behind. The mining industry was actually one of the first industries alongside defense to adopt automation technology, but since that first step, there has not been much progress.

Over the last few years, the mining industry has faced increasing environmental, social, and resource-based pressure to change the way it operates. As an indirect result of being so set in its ways, widespread automation may be the only way to bring the mining industry up to date.

Tectonic shifts

The mining industry has been dominated by a handful of companies for decades, and these companies are understandably reluctant to change the way they do things.

Moose Cree First Nation withdraws legal obstacle for NioBay exploration (CBC News Sudbury – November 18, 2019)

November 18, 2019

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sudbury/

Company hopes to conduct test drilling on area approximately 45 km south of Moosonee

Moose Cree First Nation says it has withdrawn its application for a judicial review of mining company NioBay’s drilling permit in the James Bay lowlands.

In January, NioBay had received a permit from Ontario’s Ministry of Energy, Northern Development and Mines to drill eight test holes near South Bluff Creek for deposits of niobium, which is used in electronics and to strengthen steel.

But in March, NioBay reported that MCFN and a member of the community had brought the application forward, seeking to set aside the company’s exploration permit. Chief Mervin Cheechoo and the Moose Cree Council said now they withdrew the application because NioBay had promised in writing not to build a mine without the support of Moose Cree First Nation.

Northern Ontario sculptor casts his legacy in bronze – by Colleen Romaniuk (Northern Ontario Business – November 18, 2019)

November 18, 2019

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

Tyler Fauvelle has installed public monuments across Ontario including a statue of Stompin’ Tom Connors in Sudbury

Tyler Fauvelle’s work is focused on ordinary people doing extraordinary things. From a small studio located in Lively, a suburb of Sudbury, the Northern Ontario sculptor creates his work in clay by hand. He then casts the work (at his studio space in Toronto) in bronze or a metal-infused medium to create the finished product.

Not only does he create smaller pieces, but he has also had the chance to create monumental installations that have been featured across Canada.

In June 2016, Fauvelle unveiled a life-size bronze statue commemorating Chief Francis Pegahmagabow, Canada’s most highly decorated Indigenous soldier and early First Nations’ rights activist, in Parry Sound, about 160 kilometres south of Sudbury.