May 7, 2012 – Republic of Mining

Vancouver forgets its lifeblood is resources – Edmonton Journal Editorial (May 5, 2012)

May 7, 2012

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

It’s what some on the West Coast might regard as an inconvenient truth. Although it is known for its spectacular natural beauty and as a hotbed of environmental activism, Vancouver is actually built on old-fashioned resource wealth.

Many of the key commodities Canada exports to the world – from lumber, pulp, coal and wheat to potash and yes, even Alberta’s crude oil – have been shipped for decades through the city’s sprawling port.

Already Canada’s busiest cargo hub and a vital link for Asian imports, Port Metro Vancouver plans to boost capacity by 50 per cent over the next 15 years. Yet, the port is only one aspect of the crucial role Vancouver plays in Canada’s resource-driven economy, which needs expanded access to Asia’s fast-growing markets to ensure the country’s future prosperity.

Dozens of major mining, forest products and resource services firms are based in Vancouver, with operations all over the world. These firms in turn drive much of the activity in the city’s legal, accounting and investment firms.

Mining show uncovers the hidden riches of the industry in Canada – by Dave Cooper (Edmonton Journal – May 5, 2012)

May 7, 2012

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

EDMONTON – Walking into the Shaw Conference Centre, professional gold panner Yukon Dan Moore stands over eager young miners swishing water through gravel, looking for gleaming flecks.

“Folks always ask is there any gold left in the world. Wow, there will always be gold, it’s everywhere,” said Moore, who with a long grey beard, leather hat and vest looks like he just left his riverside haunts. “I pan in the Thompson and other rivers in B.C., and I make a good living at it.”

If Moore is at one end of the mining process, University of Alberta mining engineering students such as Josh Andrews are at the other. He and others watched children driving Caterpillar simulators or using a toothpick to break apart a chocolate chip cookie — the toothpicks, which cost pretend money, represent equipment, while the chocolate is the ore.

Break too many toothpicks and the cost of extraction will be more than the ore is worth. “It’s a basic mining concept. We are trying to get kids to understand the challenges of mining,” said Andrews, who graduates and leaves soon for his first full-time job with Teck, Canada’s largest mining company.

Diamond mines in Canada at risk – by Matthew McClearn (Canadian Business Magazine – May 04, 2012)

November 4, 2015May 7, 2012

Founded in 1928, Canadian Business is the longest-publishing business magazine in Canada.

Diamonds are symbols of permanence. Some—thought to have arrived on meteorites—may be 10 billion years old, more ancient than the planet itself. The fortunes of diamond mines, by contrast, can be protean. That’s worrisome for the Northwest Territories, home to Canada’s two largest diamond mines, Ekati and Diavik. Since November, their majority owners (multinational mining giants BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto, respectively) both have commenced reviews of their diamond operations, effectively putting both mines up for sale. Some analysts speculate these reviews could result in individual mine sales or initial public offerings of entire diamond divisions.

Canada’s diamond industry has also reached a crossroads, for related reasons. It’s been more than two decades since geologists Chuck Fipke and Stewart Blusson discovered diamond-rich kimberlites in the N.W.T., sparking the biggest staking rush in Canadian history. Their Ekati mine, developed in partnership with BHP, opened in 1998. Rio’s Diavik followed in 2003. It’s tough to understate these mines’ impact on an industry characterized for most of the 20th century by monopolistic practices. By the early 2000s, Canada had become the world’s third-largest diamond-producing nation, behind Botswana and Russia. Our mines helped break the famed De Beers cartel.

It couldn’t last forever, though. In 2007, two men pondered the industry’s future. Tom Hoefer, then manager of public affairs at Diavik, warned at a conference that the industry needed to ramp up exploration. Canada’s mines were all old discoveries, and it was taking ever longer to bring new ones into service.

Success is measured by the quality of succession [Sudbury’s Norcat]- by Michael Atkins (Northern Ontario Business – May 2012)

May 7, 2012

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.

Occasionally, we do the right thing in Northern Ontario. We focus on the right stuff, stay with it, attract broad-based support, stop competing with one another long enough to get something done and we move the hash marks forward.

Usually this success comes from one person or a group of like-minded people who form a working trust and are determined, fearless, single-minded, often rude, sometimes arrogant and always in a hurry.

You see this in business, politics, sports and economic development. What you don’t see often is succession from one hard-driving generation to another. One of the reasons is that, just like entrepreneurs who start their own businesses, larger than life groups or individuals in the civil society suck up the oxygen in the room and there isn’t much room for successors to grow and spread their wings. Most great politicians who change a city, a province or the country don’t think they will ever lose an election. Most entrepreneurs don’t think they will ever die. Great leaders are often too busy, too focused, and too passionate about today to give much thought to tomorrow when they have moved on. It is just unimaginable to them.

Mining industry an ‘economic pillar’ in Ontario – by Heidi Ulrichsen (Sudbury Northern Life – May 5, 2012)

May 7, 2012

This article came from Northern Life, Sudbury’s biweekly newspaper.

The province’s mining industry was praised as one of Ontario’s “economic pillars” by the acting assistant deputy minister for the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines during the annual Sudbury Mining Week luncheon May 4.

“I think the industry will play a significant role as the government works to address the province’s fiscal and economic challenges,” Cindy Blanchard-Smith said.

The mining industry employs about 27,000 people in the province directly, and another 50,000 indirectly, Blanchard-Smith said. In Sudbury, Canada’s “de facto centre of mining excellence,” the value of mineral production was $4.4 billion in 2011.

Mining has taken place here for well over a century, and “many experts feel we’ll still be mining in Sudbury for another century,” she said. Blanchard-Smith also praised the mining supply and services sector, which employs more than 25,000 people in northern Ontario alone.

There are more than 500 of these types of businesses in the north, producing supplies and services worth more than $5.6 billion annually. “Sudbury has an established reputation for innovation and excellence in all areas of mining exploration, mine development and rehabilitation,” Blanchard-Smith said.