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Day: July 20, 2012

Anti-exploration NIMBYs win in Whitehorse, but elsewhere perhaps not so – by Kip Keen (Mineweb.com – July 20, 2012)

www.mineweb.com

Mineral explorers in urban areas come up against NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) opposition as the will of mineral explorers meets with the will of the public, but economic necessity is turning the tables in some areas of the world.

HALIFAX, NS –  If you had plans to stake a claim in downtown Whitehorse, the capital of the Yukon, forget it, at least for the next five years. The Yukon territorial government, after prodding from the Whitehorse City Council, has put a moratorium on staking of hard rock claims in one of North America’s more storied gold jurisdictions. Whitehorse, after all, was a prospector’s hub during the Yukon Gold Rush and, indeed, a launching point for Yukon’s recent gold renaissance. But Whitehorse is no more the dusty turn-of-the-19th-century town where, for the most part, destitute men descended to make their fortunes, of which a few did and many did not. It is now a growing city centre – if minuscule by global standards with about 25,000 inhabitants – with a populace that has more than mining on their mind.
 
Indeed the banning of claim staking in Whitehorse has for years been an issue. Of all banner bearers, one of the more vocal has been the Whitehorse Country Ski Club. With the prospect of mineral development in the city’s parks and ski trail system, it has demanded a ban on claim staking in town. It is a rather surreal issue that might befuddle a Parisien, Londoner or even Vancouverite for that matter: to find wooden posts with small metal tags nailed to their tops stabbed into the earth at, say, a local park.

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Canada & Miners ‘Guilty’ but Economy Thrives – by Jon Nadler (Resource Investor – July 20, 2012)

http://www.resourceinvestor.com/?ref=nav

The final trading session of this once again indecisive week in gold commenced with a price drop. The yellow metal erased Thursday’s gains and retreated to under $1,575 in slow pre-market action as the US dollar picked up some steam following its visit to near two-week lows on the trade-weighted index yesterday. Also contributing to the decline in bullion prices were the softer euro (falling to under $1.22 against the dollar once again) and the losses in crude oil (it fell 1.4% to $91.35 per barrel). As of this writing, gold appeared set to close out the week with a half-percent loss in value but the final tally remains to be ascertained later on in the day.
 
The euro suffered in the wake of once again rising Spanish borrowing costs and declining demand for that country’s bonds. Major Spanish unions have called for a nationwide protest against the government’s drastic austerity measures. The post EU meeting euphoria that was in the air just a few weeks ago appears to have dissipated with the summer thermals over in the Old World.
 
Silver spot prices dropped by almost 40 cents to trade at $26.92 per ounce on the bid-side in New York this morning. Analysts at Standard Bank (SA) note that silver stockpiles remain high (especially in China) and that demand from the industrial sector for the white metal is tepid at best. China has only imported 779 tonnes of silver in the year-to-date as against the 1,153 tonnes that it took in last year in the same timeframe.

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Elliot Lake: The first rescuers inside the mall share their harrowing account – by by Michael Friscolanti with Andrew Stobo Sniderman (Maclean’s Magazine – July 9, 2012)

http://www2.macleans.ca/?cid=navlogo

Plus, what the tragedy in Elliot Lake says about our country’s readiness to deal with catastrophes

In places like Elliot Lake (population 11,300), the locals like to say that everyone knows everyone. It’s not true, of course. Even the smallest of towns have strangers. But in this pocket of northern Ontario—where Lucie Aylwin was proudly born and raised—it’s hard to find someone who didn’t know her. An employment counsellor stationed at the Algo Centre Mall, the 37-year-old helped countless residents fine-tune their resumés and land a job. “She would help anybody,” says her fiancé, Gary Gendron. “If she wasn’t capable of doing it, she would find a way of doing it. She would never give up.”
 
On that Saturday afternoon, June 23, Aylwin was at work—not in her usual office, but at the lottery kiosk on the mall’s second floor, right across from the food court. With a wedding to plan, she took the weekend job to help pay the bills. “We had breakfast together,” Gendron recalls. “She gave me another big hug and a kiss and said: ‘I’ll see you at 6:30.’ ”
 
It was a few minutes past 2 o’clock when Doloris Perizzolo walked toward the lottery counter. The 74-year-old widow was a food-court regular, another familiar face among so many. Just days earlier, Perizzolo had won $1,000 on a “Money Multiplier” scratch ticket. She was back again to test her luck.

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The Jeffrey Mine loan makes sense, demand for asbestos is high – by John Aylen (Montreal Gazette – July 20, 2012

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

John Aylen is a spokesman for the Jeffrey Mine

Alana Wilson’s opinion piece of July 19 (“The asbestos bailout: your tax dollars, not well spent”) draws conclusions based on erroneous facts. As with any argument based on misconceptions and half-truths, the conclusions that follow do not hold.
 
One of the principal assertions Ms. Wilson makes is that the market for chrysotile is declining. Nothing could be further from the truth. Chrysotile asbestos is in high demand as an effective, low-cost and safe material used in the production of cement roofing tiles and pipes. Throughout the developing world (60 per cent of the world’s population), the need and ability to put a low-cost roof over the heads of the poorest of the poor is steadily increasing.

The demand for chrysotile has risen since 2008, and this fact was a key consideration in the reopening of the Jeffrey Mine and in the Quebec government’s decision to provide a loan to the venture.

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The asbestos bailout: your tax dollars, not well spent – by Alana Wilson (Montreal Gazette – July 19, 2012)

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

Alana Wilson is a senior research analyst at the Fraser Institute’s Global Centre for Mining Studies (miningfacts.org)

Canada’s mining industry is globally competitive, and has long succeeded without much in the way of government subsidies. It even thrived in the last recession by responding to market demand. Yet instead of letting markets drive mining investment in Quebec, the provincial government is bailing out the asbestos industry using taxpayer money – and this for a product that is harmful to human health.
 
In recent years, market demand for chrysotile asbestos produced in Canada shrank dramatically, which led to a halt of chrysotile mining. But instead of letting mines stay closed, taxpayer funds are now being used to gamble against markets and reopen an unprofitable chrysotile mine.
 
Premier Jean Charest recently approved a $58-million loan to allow the Jeffrey asbestos mine to reopen. This follows months of negotiation and several extensions of the government loan offer to give private partners more time to raise money.

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NEWS RELEASE: The London Stock Exchange – A haven for laundered conflict assets?

Rights and Accountability in Development (RAID)

THURSDAY 19 JULY 2012

In a report released today, Asset laundering and AIM: Congo, corporate misconduct and the market value of human rights, the business and human rights organisation Rights and Accountability in Development (RAID) catalogues the inadequacies of the London Stock Exchange’s regulatory framework. The Central African Mining and Exploration Company plc (CAMEC) was allowed to trade and flourish on London’s junior Alternative Investment Market (AIM) despite its close links to Robert Mugabe’s ZANU PF party (Zimbabwe), the dubious provenance of its Congolese mining assets and the unsavoury reputation of key business associates.

RAID’s report is the first systematic examination of the extent to which corporate conduct in zones of conflict such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is taken into account by stock market regulations. RAID submitted a detailed report to the Exchange in June 2011 on compliance with AIM rules by CAMEC and its adviser, Seymour Pierce. A year later, and the Exchange has not dealt publiclywith the matters raised in the complaint.

“AIM’s lack of transparency means there is a black hole at the heart of its regulatory system”, said Tricia Feeney, RAID’s Executive Director.

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Support for Ring of Fire Moratorium – AFN Annual General Assembly – Draft Resolution #16/2012

(L to R: Angus Toulouse, former AFN Regional Chief for Ontario; Sonny Gagnon, Chief of Aroland First Nation; Peter Moonias, Chief of Neskantaga First Nation (Lansdowne House); Shawn Atleo, Chief of the Assembly of First Nations (November 2011/Photo supplied by Matawa First Nations Tribal Council)

AFN Annual General Assembly, July 17 – 19, 2012, Toronto, Ontario/ Draft Resolution #16/2012

TITLE: Support for Ring of Fire Moratorium

SUBJECT: Free, Prior and Informed Consent; Treaty

MOVED BY: Chief Peter Moonias, Neskantaga First Nation, ON

SECONDED BY: Chief Sonny Gagnon Aroland First Nation, ON

WHEREAS:

A. Article 32 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples states that “1. Indigenous peoples have the right to determine and develop priorities and strategies for the development or use of their lands or territories and other resources; 2. States shall consult and cooperate in good faith with the indigenous peoples concerned through their own representative institutions in order to obtain their free and informed consent prior to the approval of any project affecting their lands or territories and other resources, particularly in connection with the development, utilization or exploitation of mineral, water or other resources; 3. States shall provide effective mechanisms for just and fair redress for any such activities, and appropriate measures shall be taken to mitigate adverse environmental, economic, social, cultural or spiritual impact”.

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Atleo to press private sector on respect for aboriginal treaty rights – by Tamara Baluja (Globe and Mail – July 20, 2012)

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.

 Following the lead of many chiefs who demanded the AFN take a more assertive role,
the AFN passed a resolution calling for the eviction of mining companies in Northern
Ontario’s Ring of Fire.”We’re being bullied by a giant mining company and a
desperate province,” Chris Moonias, a band councillor from the Neskantaga First
Nation, told the assembled chiefs.

With natives feeling ignored on key treaty rights, Shawn Atleo, the newly re-elected Chief of the Assembly of First Nations, says the advocacy organization will take the conversation directly to businesses on resource development. At the same time, he didn’t rule out delaying key projects like the Northern Gateway pipeline.

“The chiefs are standing together and saying if you do not deal with the recognition of our title rights, it will not result in more efficient development,” he said the day after he was re-elected to a three-year term as national chief of Canada’s largest aboriginal organization.

With billions of dollars at stake in projects like the Northern Gateway pipeline and mines in Northern Ontario, Canadian business leaders have urged politicians to give aboriginal communities a larger role in the development of Canada’s energy industry.

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China buys into Canada – by Vanessa Lu (Toronto Star – July 20, 2012)

The Toronto Star, has the largest circulation in Canada. The paper has an enormous impact on federal and Ontario politics as well as shaping public opinion.

Just five years ago, China’s foreign direct investment in Canada was too little to report. But since the 2008 financial crisis, the inflows of cash from across the Pacific have soared, especially as a booming China with $3 trillion (U.S.) in reserves, moves to shore up its supply chain access to certain commodities.

Given Canada’s natural resources potential, China has looking here for investment opportunities. Well-publicized deals include China Investment Corp., the sovereign wealth fund, buying a $1.74 billion stake in Teck Resources, or the state-owned China Petroleum Corp, better known as Sinopec Group, buying a 9 per cent chunk of oil sands producer Syncrude for $4.56 billion.

Last year, Sinopec also acquired 100 per cent ownership in Calgary-based Daylight Energy, an oil and gas explorer with operations in Alberta and British Columbia, for $2.2 billion last year.

The deals keep coming, a far cry from 2004, when China Minmetals Corp. initially bid to acquire Noranda, raising considerable political concerns, given that Minmetals is a state-owned Chinese enterprise. The deal eventually fell apart, with Noranda merging instead with Falconbridge.

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Canada’s Arctic push: Left out in the cold? – by Yadullah Hussain (National Post – July 20, 2012)

The National Post is Canada’s second largest national paper.

The five hotels of the Northwest Territories town of Norman Wells (population: 800) saw more than their fair share of hard hats last year. “You could not get a room there for six months last winter,” said David Ramsay, Northwest Territories’ minister of transportation industry, tourism and investment. “Grocery stores saw a 100% increase in sales; it was unprecedented economic activity for that period of time — we are going to see even more this coming winter.”

Norman Wells is not alone in witnessing this bonanza. Towns and communities across the vast Arctic landscape are waking up to the riches that lie buried beneath, as oil executives scope for prospects and Arctic governments take another ‘strategic’ look at the region’s hydrocarbon and mineral riches.
 
The area shared by Canada, Denmark (Greenland), Finland, Iceland, Norway, Russia, Sweden and the United States offers an estimated 46 trillion cubic metres of undiscovered global natural gas, or 30% of the global total. In addition, it holds 90 billion barrels of oil — or 13% of the estimated global total of undiscovered oil, according to a 2008 U.S. Geological Survey.

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Oil sands monitoring must be credible – Globe and Mail Editorial (July 20, 2012)

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

It made for a dramatic photo op when federal Environment Minister Peter Kent and his counterpart in Alberta, Diana McQueen, swooped in via helicopter this week to check out some of the new oil sands monitoring sites in northern Alberta. The new stations are the result of a joint federal-provincial plan announced in February to sharply beef up the scientific study of the cumulative effects of oil sands development on water, air, land and biodiversity.
 
The two levels of government deserve praise for moving ahead with a system that will examine many more sites, more frequently, and look for a much broader number of contaminants than ever before. Compared to the inconsistent and haphazard testing in the past, the new program is a huge improvement.

Still, there is more to be done, and the expansion of monitoring needs to be sped up. Already the program is long overdue. Despite years of claims by industry that the oil sands were being developed in a sustainable manner, report after report noted that there was little scientific evidence to support this and insisted that far more data needed to be gathered.

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Atleo must use mandate [resource development] – Thunder Bay Chronicle-Journal Editorial (July 20, 2012)

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

IT turns out that claims of a close race putting Shawn Atleo in danger of defeat were off the mark. But while the incumbent is back in charge of the Assembly of First Nations with a comfortable majority and a renewed mandate, his challenge is greater than ever. Challenges, really, for there are two.

First, he must quell those voices among First Nations who claim Atleo is too tight with Ottawa. Healthy consultation will achieve more than still more confrontation which now wearies many Canadians.

Atleo’s second obstacle is cobbling together something resembling a united front among an assembly of traditionally but notoriously independent members in order to convince them and the other levels of government to build a model of success around a new natural resources boom.

For the first time ever there exists a path for First Nations to lift themselves out of the poverty and dependence that for most is the norm. The exceptions have been those whose leaders used opportunity to their advantage. Whether it was building a local economy around business or the proximity of forests, oil, gas or minerals, there are a relative few First Nations who got out of the old traps and built a new life for their people.

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