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‘Resource nationalism’ clouds China’s Africa ambitions – by MASANORI TOBITA and TETSUSHI TAKAHASHI (Nikkei Asian Review – June 23, 2018)

https://asia.nikkei.com/

VIENNA/BEIJING — Rising nationalism in African nations over control of resources is starting to overshadow the efforts of Chinese and other foreign companies to develop their operations on the continent.

Some countries are demanding that foreign companies involved in mining invest in local companies, and plan to increase taxes on such foreign enterprises. These countries aim to fill their coffers by reclaiming ownership of mining concessions, anticipating a recovery in global resources prices.

On Wednesday, Chinese President Xi Jinping outlined plans for a tour of Africa in July in an apparent effort to shore up ties with various countries on the continent. The initiative comes as China’s relations with the U.S. have been strained by concerns over trade and security.

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SA missing a gem of an opportunity for creating jobs, wealth – by Allan Seccombe (Business Day – June 25, 2018)

https://www.businesslive.co.za/

A short drive from the edge of the gold belt west of Johannesburg lies one of the world’s biggest alluvial diamond deposits, stretching deep into the Atlantic Ocean. But onerous, costly regulations, corruption and nit-picking officials are destroying a once-vibrant junior mining sector, say a diminishing number of diggers.

Digger after digger talks of how difficult it has become to operate small mines that dig into ancient riverbeds more than 100-million years old, and an even older seafloor.

These deposits should lend themselves to small-scale mining, wealth creation and employment across hundreds of kilometres stretching through farmlands, impoverished towns and settlements where unemployment is rife and work opportunities outside agriculture are slim. But that isn’t the case.

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Acacia Mining’s Tanzania tax dispute drags on (Reuters Africa – June 25, 2018)

https://af.reuters.com/

LONDON (Reuters) – Acacia Mining said on Monday its majority shareholder Barrick Gold would not provide a new deadline for the completion of talks to end a crippling dispute over taxes in Tanzania after failing to meet a mid-year target to do so.

Barrick, which is negotiating on Acacia’s behalf with the Tanzanian government, had previously said it would provide an agreement for approval by Acacia’s board by the end of June.

But in its own statement on Sunday, Barrick said talks continued and backed away from providing a new deadline “in order to allow the process to continue in an orderly manner.”

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Commentary: Zinc rally over? Bears think so but spreads bite back – by Andy Home (Reuters U.K. – June 21, 2018)

https://uk.reuters.com/

LONDON (Reuters) – Is that it for the zinc rally? After hitting a 10-year high of $3,595.50 per tonne in February, the London Metal Exchange (LME) price has been sliding ever since. The retreat has extended to $2,946.50 so far on Thursday morning, the lowest level since August last year.

Expectations for one last bull hurrah have faded as exchange stocks have rebuilt, apparently calling time on the supply chain tightness that underpinned zinc’s two-year charge from the January 2016 low of $1,444.50 per tonne.

As ever with this particular metal, though, appearances can be deceptive, as shorts have just found out to their cost. Time-spreads across the front part of the LME zinc curve have tightened sharply over the last couple of weeks, a seemingly anomalous outcome given rising inventory.

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First new all-electric mine dumps diesel; cuts costs, pollution – by Susan Taylor and Barbara Lewis (Reuters U.S. – June 21, 2018)

https://www.reuters.com/

CHAPLEAU, Ontario/LONDON (Reuters) – Hundreds of feet below thick boreal forest blanketing the Canadian Shield, a squad of near-silent, battery-powered machines are tunneling toward gold in a multimillion-dollar mining experiment to ditch diesel.

Goldcorp Inc (G.TO) (GG.N) is building the world’s first new all-electric mine, a high-stakes gambit to replace noisy, fume-belching equipment being closely watched by a diesel-dependent industry.

A rough-hewn tunnel, some 800 feet underground, seems an incongruous setting for revolutionary technology, but front-line workers call it a game changer.

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Trump’s Fickleness Is Dulling Gold’s Appeal, Deutsche Fund Says – by Luzi-Ann Javier (Bloomberg News – June 20, 2018)

https://www.bloomberg.com/

Gold is failing in its traditional role as a haven in turbulent times, and a Deutsche fund manager has an explanation.

On Tuesday, as the deepening trade spat between the U.S. and China sent the S&P 500 index tumbling the most in a week, investors sought haven in the dollar, U.S. Treasuries and yen, overlooking gold. For Darwei Kung, a portfolio manager of the $3.3 billion Deutsche Enhanced Commodity Strategy Fund, the relatively higher transaction costs for bullion may be a contributing factor.

Abrupt changes in President Donald Trump’s policies, such as his alternating stances on North Korea, fuel speculation that his temperament toward tariffs on China could also change over the next few months, weakening the case for holding haven assets over a longer period, Kung said.

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Eira Thomas takes the reins at Lucara – by Alisha Hiyate (Northern Miner – June 19, 2018)

http://www.northernminer.com/

Lightning has struck more than once so far in Eira Thomas’s career of more than 25 years. The geologist famously spotted a nearly 2-carat diamond in drill core — an incredibly rare occurrence — during exploration at Lac de Gras in 1994, at what would become the Diavik mine in the Northwest Territories.

And as a founder and director of Lucara Diamond (TSX: LUC), she was part of the leadership when the company unearthed a 1,109-carat stone — the second largest diamond in history — at its Karowe mine in Botswana in November 2015.

“I’ve been very fortunate,” said Thomas in an interview in May. “Those were obviously two exciting milestones for me in my career, but I think with each and every project that I’ve worked on there’ve been those moments.”

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Trump touts ‘America first’ policies in Duluth warehouse – by John Myers (Duluth News Tribune – June 20, 2018)

https://www.duluthnewstribune.com/

President Donald Trump on Wednesday spent more than an hour in a Duluth harborfront warehouse talking about iron ore and copper mining, trade and his relentless effort to cut government regulations.

In one of his patented “roundtable” discussions, Trump was in friendly territory with about 200 supporters — many of them representing mining, construction and shipping interests — gathered in a spruced-up Lake Superior Warehousing building in the shadow of the Blatnik Bridge.

Trump talked about renegotiating trade deals to put American interests first, and he praised his administration’s efforts to slash government regulations across the breadth of the nation’s economy, including mining.

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1984 Falconbridge tragedy still echoes for Sudbury residents, mining community – by Benjamin Aubé (CBC News Sudbury – June 20, 2018)

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

Disaster led to 1986 inquiry into mine ground control and emergency preparedness

June 20, 1984, is a day that still resonates in the minds of many Sudbury residents and throughout the mining community. About 200 workers were on shift at Falconbridge Mine that morning. Four of them never got out.

At 10:12 a.m., a seismic event that registered a 3.5 on the Richter scale struck the mine, causing a major rock fall and trapping many of the miners.

Despite rescue attempts over the next several days, Sulo Korpela, Richard Chenier, Daniel Lavallee and Wayne St. Michel each lost their lives. On Wednesday, an annual service commemorating the 34-year anniversary of the tragedy was held at the Mine Mill 598 Unifor Campground at Lake Richard.

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Exclusive: Stop exploiting Africa, share resources, Pope tells Europe – by Philip Pullella (Reuters U.S. – June 20, 2018)

https://www.reuters.com/

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) – Europe should stop exploiting Africa and invest in ways that benefit the continent more, including by sharing mineral wealth more equitably, Pope Francis said.

“We must invest in Africa, but invest in an orderly way and create employment, not go there to exploit it,” he told Reuters in a wide-ranging interview, while discussing the migration of Africans to Europe.

“When a country grants independence to an African country it is from the ground up – but the subsoil is not independent. And then people (outside Africa) complain about hungry Africans coming here. There are injustices there!”

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EDITORIAL: Thumbs up for mining protocol (Winnipeg Sun – June 20, 2018)

http://winnipegsun.com/

A new protocol unveiled by the Pallister government designed to guide future mining projects, including their impact on First Nations, is a good example of what reconciliation should look like.

Growth, Enterprise and Trade Minister Blaine Pedersen announced the Manitoba-First Nations Mineral Development protocol on Friday. It grants First Nations the authority to decide whether they want mining projects on their land and provides them with a more equitable share of revenues generated from those projects.

Ron Evans, a former chief of Norway House Cree Nation, was the co-chair of the protocol report. He says he’s encouraged to see government’s commitment to getting input from Indigenous communities on mining projects.

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Eighty tonnes in a single scoop: Mega-mining iron ore – by Phil Mercer (BBC News/Sydney – June 21, 2018)

https://www.bbc.com/

It is the rock that has fortified Australia’s recession-defying economy. Iron ore has helped to raise living standards in the country, supercharge pension funds, and bankroll governments. It is the key ingredient of steel, and is Australia’s most lucrative export.

Last year, the trade, mostly to China, as well as South Korea and Japan, was worth 63bn Australian dollars ($45bn; £35bn).

Over the past decade booming export volumes have soared by more than 200%. It is without doubt an economic colossus, and Australia is the world’s largest exporter of iron ore. But given that global iron ore prices have fallen sharply over the past decade, should Australia try to move away from the sector?

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A Canadian firm wants to start mining on Utah lands that used to be part of Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument – by Brian Maffly (Salt Lake Tribune – June 21, 2018)

https://www.sltrib.com/

A Canadian firm has announced its intention to mine copper and cobalt on public lands in Utah’s scenic Circle Cliffs east of Boulder, telling potential investors it has acquired what appear to be the first mining claims filed on lands removed from Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.

The move set off alarms among environmental groups seeking the monument’s restoration, but it remains unlikely that Glacier Lake Resources’ plans will be realized anytime soon. The Bureau of Land Management will continue to manage these lands as a monument until a new management plan is in place.

“No one has validly changed the status of these lands. It’s still a national monument. It’s still closed to mining and any mineral exploration. Any claims like this are invalid,” said Nada Culver, senior counsel to The Wilderness Society.

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Gold Street Is Where South Africa’s Mining History Goes to Die – by Ana Monteiro and Felix Njini (Bloomberg News – June 20, 208)

https://www.bloomberg.com/

Miners laid off, mines closing, losses mounting—a huge headache for President Ramaphosa

The death rattle of the industry that once symbolised South Africa can be heard in the town of Carletonville—on Gold Street

That’s where Paseka Selemela has been guarding cars since 2010, when the scaffolding business he worked for closed. Prior to that, he was an assistant at a now-shuttered mine owned by AngloGold Ashanti. Nor has he found work in other gold mines around the town, home to the world’s deepest shafts.

Many of his friends and family members also have joined the legions of the retrenched, including 8 500 people in the area last year alone.

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De Beers playing poker with perception by launching Lightbox? – by David McKay (MiningMx.com – June 19, 2018)

https://www.miningmx.com/

ANGLO American’s 85%-owned De Beers may have pulled off a strategic coup by unveiling plans to launch a new brand of synthetic diamonds. These are the stones that are ‘grown’ artificially in a laboratory and against which the diamond giant has previously fought a marketing campaign.

In fact, the group spent some $140m in 2017 alone promoting naturally occurring diamonds which it says truly represent the profound emotions that inspire wedding bands and other anniversary gifts. Now, however, De Beers has performed an about-turn by unveiling its Lightbox range of synthetics. What could it portend?

According to analysts, this is not really the acknowledgement of diamond synthetics that it appears (although De Beers has its own line of synthetic diamonds which are used primarily for industrial purposes). Instead, it’s a clever commercial ploy aimed at better controlling the pricing and proliferation of lab-grown diamonds by other producers.

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