March 15, 2011 – Republic of Mining

OMA member profile: CAMIRO – research for mining’s future

March 15, 2011

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.

Ontario Mining Association member the Canadian Mining Industry Research Organization (CAMIRO) has been leading a scientific approach to improving sector workplaces for decades. Sudbury-based CAMIRO, which officially started in 1996, has actually been operating since 1975 under various banners as an industry collaborative research broker.

The industry-based, not-for-profit organization with a membership of mining companies and those with an interest in the mining sector has three divisions – exploration, mining and metallurgical processing. CAMIRO strives to have multiple members sponsor specific research initiatives with the results broadly shared. Many OMA members are involved in CAMIRO. The collaborative nature of how CAMIRO operates facilitates government funding assistance without appearing to favour any specific company.

“We reach into the industry’s needs and figure out what we should be working on to benefit everyone,” said Charles Graham, Managing Director of CAMIRO’s Mining Division. “CAMIRO carries out the administrative functions of research – we act as brokers to get funding before we spend it on research projects and we farm out specific aspects of the project to the most likely to succeed whether universities, independent researchers, mining companies or government.”

The [Ontario] Ring of Fire – by Peter Gorrie (ONnature Magazine: Fall 2010)

March 15, 2011March 15, 2011

Ontario Nature is a charitable organization representing more than 30,000 members and supporters and 140 member groups across Ontario. Their goal is to protect wild species and wild spaces through conservation, education and public engagement. This article is from their magazine On Nature. A more thorough explanation of Ontario Nature’s mission and goals is listed at the end of this posting.

Peter Gorrie is a Toronto-based freelance writer specializing in environmental and energy issues, and the environment columnist for The Toronto Star.

For an extensive list of articles on this mineral discovery, please go to: Ontario’s Ring of Fire Mineral Discovery

The Ring of Fire – by Peter Gorrie

Buried treasure – copper, nickel, diamonds, chromite – lies beneath northern Ontario’s vast boreal landscape, prompting a frenzy of unchecked mining activity despite the provincial government’s two-year-old promise to safeguard half the boreal region and promote sustainable development in the other half. Will the Ring of Fire become Ontario’s tar sands?

Standing beside the metal-clad head frame of a former gold mine in the middle of the broad northern Ontario landscape near Aroland First Nation, Andrew Megan Sr. tells me a story that, he says, took place some 70 years earlier.

His father and uncle, working their trapline, found a rock flecked with gold. The men showed the rock to a non-native prospector and, when asked, showed him where they had come upon it. In return, he gave each a pouch of tobacco.

Months passed – how many is unclear – but one day as Megan, his father, uncle and relatives sat in their bush camp, they heard a mechanical roar. They scattered as a bulldozer crashed through the trees and brush. The next year, work began on a mine that continued, off and on, until 1984. Prospectors had been exploring and staking the area for more than a decade, but the rock found by Megan’s father and uncle pinpointed a potentially rich vein of gold that spurred development of the site. Over the next four decades, a series of companies, including Osulake Mines and Consolidated Louanna, attempted to determine the extent and value of the ore body and start operations, but the mine didn’t produce any gold for sale until near the end of its life.

Megan, now 72 and a respected elder, recounts the story to make a point he considers crucial.

Liberals committed to developing northern Ontario – by Rick Bartolucci

March 15, 2011

Rick Bartolucci is the MPP for Sudbury and the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing.

The famed economist John Kenneth Galbraith said, “Nothing is so admirable in politics as a short memory.” It’s a quality held by those who want you to forget the results of the NDP and the Harris/Hudak Conservatives during their respective years of governing Ontario.

I often say that in order to appreciate how far we’ve come, we need to remember where we’ve been. I recall what Sudbury endured during those years. I also know that the Ontario Liberals sprung into action once elected in 2003, determined to focus on our region.

We have a strong northern caucus with three northern cabinet ministers who passionately advocate for northern communities on a daily basis. That commitment was recently evidenced as we launched the Northern Growth Plan and set aside $5 million to create a Northern Policy Institute to ensure northerners have a greater say in policy decisions affecting our region.