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Day: January 29, 2013

Close ties with First Nations key to Canadian mining success – Fontaine – by Simon Rees (MiningWeekly.com – January 29, 2013)

http://www.miningweekly.com/page/americas-home

TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – Few mining companies developing Canadian projects within First Nation (aboriginal) territory would do so without seeking to build a close working partnership.

Those who disregard or downplay the importance of First Nation consultation will find their projects languishing in a legal quagmire. Stemming from this, there can be a train of negative publicity, while subsequent and inevitable delays then dent potential investor confidence and shareholder opinion.

So why do some mining companies still make elementary mistakes in relation to First Nation communities? How can these be avoided and what are the best methods for fostering a close working relationship? If disputes do arise, what are the best methods to seek a fair and mutually-rewarding resolution?

Norton Rose’s senior advisor Phil Fontaine has a wealth of expertise within the field of advising mining companies how to build bonds with First Nations communities and how to construct strong and lasting partnerships. As a former National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations (a post he held three times), Fontaine has also been instrumental in raising First Nations rights issues across Canada.

“The working environment has changed significantly,” he told Mining Weekly Online. “Even in the recent past there was no requirement to talk with First Nations communities.

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[Sudbury Area Mining Supply and Services Association and Dick DeStefano] Mining with merit – by Lindsay Kelly (Northern Ontario Business – February 2013)

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.

Sudbury mining cluster changed face of community

During the last decade, Dick DeStefano has led the Sudbury Area Mining Supply and Services Association (SAMSSA) to represent mining excellence in Northern Ontario, and its success can be attributed to one thing: boredom.

“I literally was bored,” conceded DeStefano, SAMSSA’s executive director and a founding partner. “I was near retirement, and when I was 65 I decided that I really hadn’t accomplished what I wanted to accomplish and that was to change the face of the community.”

After a career in consulting, he become a passionate advocate of the Northern Ontario mining supply and services sector, bringing together mining companies, innovators, suppliers, researchers, contractors and educators into a cluster recognized around the world for its knowledge, skill, expertise and experience.

The concept was hatched in 2003 during a conversation with Paul Reid, an economic development officer for the City of Greater Sudbury, out of which the pair determined the North’s 100-plus years of mining experience was a hidden asset that needed to be recognized and exploited.

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Chinese miners sent home in B.C. workers dispute – by CBC News (January 28, 2013)

http://www.cbc.ca/bc/

HD Mining says it has also delayed plans to bring more miners from China

The company that brought miners from China to work on a B.C. coal project says it is sending some of the workers back home and is not bringing any more to Canada for the time being due to court delays.

Two unions are challenging the government’s decision to allow HD Mining to bring about 200 Chinese miners to work in northern B.C., rather than hire Canadians. HD Mining announced in a release Monday that its 16 temporary foreign workers on the Murray River project are returning to China.

The workers were to have taken part in the extraction of a 100,000-tonne coal sample to determine the viability of full mine development, the company said.

“This was a difficult decision for us, but we are very concerned about the cost and disruption this litigation brought by the unions has caused to the planning of the project,” said Jody Shimkus, the mine company’s vice-president of environmental and regulatory affairs.

“We have also decided to delay bringing any additional workers to Tumbler Ridge until we have reliable certainty.”

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Ontario’s mining industry supports the province’s balance of trade

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.

The mining industry in Ontario is a steady, reliable, regular and positive contributor to the province’s balance of international trade, according to a recent sectoral economic impact study. Mining: Dynamic and Dependable for Ontario’s Future was produced by University of Toronto economists Peter Dungan and Steve Murphy.

“As Ontario’s international trade balance has deteriorated over the past 10 years due to a combination of a strengthening currency and the weakness of its major trading partner, trade in mineral products has become increasingly important,” says the study. Since 2002, the overall international trade deficit for the province has more than quadrupled to $70 billion-plus annually.

“The trade surplus for Ontario mineral products has strengthened to more than $12 billion annually, remaining positive over the entire period (2002-2011),” according to the report. “As well, Ontario international mineral trade has accounted for over half of the surplus in the country’s mineral trade over this period.”

“The Ontario international trade balances for both nickel and gold (the province’s two most important mineral products by value) have remained positive over the last years. The opening of the diamond mine in the province in 2008 has also boosted the province’s trade bottom line.”

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COMMENT: Mining in north to double by 2020 – by Marilyn Scales (Canadian Mining Journal – January 28, 2013)

Marilyn Scales is a field editor for the Canadian Mining Journal, Canada’s first mining publication. She is one of Canada’s most senior mining commentators.

OTTAWA – The Conference Board of Canada has taken a close look and said that mining employment and production in Canada’s north can almost double by the end of this decade. The Board sees Canada’s overall northern metal and non-metallic mineral output growing by 91% from 2011 to 2020, a compound annual growth rate of 7.5%. In contrast, the Canadian economy is forecast to grow by an average of just 2.2% annually over this period. The annual gross domestic product of mining in the north will reach $8.5 billion in 2020, up from $4.4 billion in 2011 (both figures in constant 2002 dollars).

That is a very rosy picture the Board has painted. But it is also the first to admit that the goal won’t be reached unless industry, government and communities address key issues including infrastructure, regulatory uncertainty, skills shortages and Aboriginal rights.

“Mining is the future economic driver of Canada’s North. To fully reap the benefits of this potential, we must find the right balance between risk and opportunity,” said Anja Jeffrey, director, Centre for the North. “For instance, governments need to be conscious of how changes to the regulatory environment can affect communities and industry. Strong efforts to ensure a favourable business climate can leave communities feeling vulnerable. Going too far in the opposite direction can act as a deterrent to investment.

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Alberta Premier Alison Redford flip-flops on budget promises – by Gillian Steward (Toronto Star – January 29, 2013)

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.

Gillian Steward is a Calgary writer and journalist whose column appears every other week.

To live in Alberta these days is to run the risk of getting severe whiplash.

This is because our provincial government often tells us how fortunate we are to live in such a prosperous a province; how Alberta is blessed with such an abundance of resources. But the next day our government tells us it doesn’t have enough money to cover its spending, there will have to be cuts to services; and we are all suddenly jerked into a different reality.

This time around our premier, Alison Redford, seems quite panicked about the drop in government revenues. So much so that she prepared a special TV spot (eight minutes) that was broadcast across the province last week at taxpayers’ expense to reassure us that the sky is not falling.

She wasn’t very clear about what exactly her government intends to do about the shortfall in revenues: the provincial budget won’t be revealed until March. All we know at this point is that the government has $6 billion less than it thought it would have, a big chunk of a projected $38-billion budget.

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Producers back TransCanada’s plan to pipe oil east – by Shawn McCarthy and Nathan VAnderklippe (Globe and Mail – January 29, 2013)

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.

OTTAWA AND CALGARY — Western Canadian oil producers fear that a growing glut of light oil in their traditional market will drive down the value of their crude, and are looking to TransCanada Corp.’s proposed west-to-east pipeline as a route to world prices for their oil.

While political proponents of the cross-country pipeline say it would bring cheap western crude to Eastern Canadian refineries, the oil companies are clearly eyeing the line as a way to get their oil into markets that are paying the world price.

“Any access to the Eastern Canadian refinery markets, to Europe or Eastern Seaboard refineries, that is a plus for the industry as a whole,” said Murray Nunns, chief executive officer of Penn West Petroleum Ltd.

TransCanada has won the endorsement for its $5-billion pipeline plan from New Brunswick Premier David Alward, who will travel to Alberta next month to visit Premier Alison Redford and put some political momentum behind the project. TransCanada says it is confident the project will be competitive with other proposed new routes, but still must line up shippers willing to make long-term commitments to justify its investment.

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UPDATE 3-Anglo American’s $4 bln hit clears decks for new CEO – by Sarah Young and Brenda Goh (Reuters.com – January 29, 2013)

http://www.reuters.com/

LONDON, Jan 29 (Reuters) – Anglo American took a $4 billion hit to its Minas Rio project on Tuesday, clearing the decks for new boss Mark Cutifani and indicating that the delayed Brazilian operation will eventually get off the ground.

Minas Rio, which is now costing Anglo more than three times its original estimates, has been seen as Anglo’s most significant failure of recent years and is partly responsible for costing outgoing chief executive Cynthia Carroll her job.

The writedown to the valuation of the huge iron ore project and a jump in the bill for its development to $8.8 billion, alongside a planned overhaul for the company’s troubled platinum business, are as near to a clean slate as new CEO Cutifani is going to get.

Shares in Anglo American gained 2.2 percent to 19.14 pounds ($30.06), topping Britain’s blue-chip leader board in midday trading after the announcement of the impairment charge. “The Minas Rio impairments give the incoming CEO a clean slate, creating a degree of positive sentiment,” Bernstein analyst Paul Gait said.

“The greater detail and clarity on the progress of Minas Rio can only increase the confidence around the executability and delivery of the project.”

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NEWS RELEASE: NAN CONGRATULATES NEW PREMIER BUT STANDS FIRM ON POSITIONS OF TREATY IMPLEMENTATION AND REVENUE SHARING

Monday, January 28, 2013

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

THUNDER BAY, ON: Nishnawbe Aski Nation (NAN) Grand Chief Harvey Yesno looks forward to working with newly elected Ontario Liberal Party leader Kathleen Wynne and insists that the Ontario Premier’s Office work with the 49 NAN First Nations on core northern priorities such as resource development investments and establish an agreement on resource revenue sharing.

“Treaty and resource revenue sharing are key to addressing the pressing and dire challenges facing the remote First Nations of northern Ontario,” said NAN Grand Chief Harvey Yesno. “Our treaty partners, Canada and Ontario must come to the table to address these issues, and not just to dialogue or discuss but strategize and implement. NAN First Nations need the process for formal agreements to get underway.”

A former school board trustee, Wynne has held several posts in outgoing premier Dalton McGuinty’s cabinets, including education, transportation and aboriginal affairs. NAN leadership has declared that provincial relations with First Nations, specifically the sharing of resources in Ontario’s remote north that is poised for significant developments, should be high priority in the coming months.

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Northerners part of historic vote – by Wayne Snider (Timmins Daily Press – January 28, 2013)

The Daily Press is the city of Timmins broadsheet newspaper.

TIMMINS – History was made on the weekend and the North was well represented. Timmins-James Bay Provincial Liberal Association president Gaetan Groleau was among the group of 15 from the riding (13 delegates and two ex officio members) at the party’s leadership convention in Toronto on the weekend. They witnessed the election of Kathleen Wynne as party leader.

“It was quite the experience,” Groleau told The Daily Press moments after arriving home Monday night. “It was a historic moment. We chose a leader and Premier as well.” The Timmins-James Bay delegates did their homework before heading south for the convention.

“All the candidates came to Timmins, so we had a chance to talk with them all,” Groleau said. “I felt all the candidates were really good, but three really stood out for Timmins. And Wynne was among the three favoured by the local delegates.

“She has been here many times and knows the area very well … and she plans on coming back,” he said. “Glen Murray was by her side, and I know they have some good proposals for Northern Ontario. “I know Charles Sousa favoured keeping the ONTC. Maybe she’ll listen.”

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Graphene Extraordinary Combination of Physical and Chemical Properties – by James Murray (NetNewsLedger.com – January 28, 2013)


Superconductor Graphene Set for Industrial… by tvnportal

http://www.netnewsledger.com/

THUNDER BAY – Mining – Graphene is an extraordinary combination of physical and chemical properties: it is the thinnest material, it conducts electricity much better than copper, it is 100-300 times stronger than steel and it has unique optical properties. Graphene is a carbon-based material that offers incredible potential.

There are several graphite discoveries in Northwestern Ontario. Zenyatta Resources in the company’s Albany Project. While many in the region are awaiting a mining future in the region awash in chromite, it is entirely possible that graphene will prove to be the mineral that will change our world far more.

The European Commission today announced the winners of a multi-billion euro competition of Future and Emerging Technologies (FET).

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Excerpt from “The History of Mining: The events, technology and people involved in the industry that forged the modern world” – by Michael Coulson

To order a copy of The History of Mining please click here: http://www.harriman-house.com/products/books/23161/business/Michael-Coulson/The-History-of-Mining/

HANS MERENSKY (1871-1952)

Hans Merensky was born in 1871 in Botshabelo in the Transvaal. His father Alexander, a German, was an ethnographer interested in the scientific study of local African culture; he was also resident missionary in the area.

In 1882 the family returned to Germany where Merensky finished his schooling and then went to the State Academy of Mining in Berlin to study mining geology and engineering, and then took a doctorate in geology at the Royal Technical College of Charlottenburg. His course professor in Berlin remarked on Merensky’s sixth sense for ferreting out mineral deposits.

Following that he worked in the coal mines of Silesia before joining the Department of Mines in East Prussia. In 1904 Merensky returned to South Africa on sabbatical from the Department to do some geological field studies and it was here that he made the first of a suite of major mineral discoveries in southern Africa. Working in the Transvaal he discovered tin near Pretoria and then became associated with Premier Diamonds.

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Wynne raises hope for [northern] dialogue – by Gord Young (North Bay Nugget – January 27, 2013)

http://www.nugget.ca/

There’s renewed hope the concerns of Northern communities will be heard now that Kathleen Wynne has been named Ontario’s next premier.

Wynne’s victory Saturday as leader of the Ontario Liberal party was greeted mostly positively but cautiously by local officials who are counting on the incoming premier to listen and understand the needs of the North.

“I respect her as a leader and as a person,” said North Bay Mayor Al McDonald, who is anticipating a better relationship between Northern Ontario and the province with Wynne at the helm. “I’m looking forward to working with her.”

Long-standing Northern concerns of being ignored and misunderstood at Queen’s Park have been exacerbated by recent decisions such as the divestment of the Ontario Northland Transportation Commission, which came without consultation.

But McDonald is hopeful that will change. He said he met with Wynne to discuss concerns such as the ONTC divestment and proposed consolidation of hydro utilities during a campaign stop in the city two weeks ago. And although she didn’t make any promises, McDonald was encouraged by Wynne and her willingness to listen.

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NEWS RELEASE: MINING IN CANADA’S NORTH EXPECTED TO NEARLY DOUBLE BY 2020, NORTHWEST TERRITORIES’ OUTLOOK TIED TO DIAMONDS

Ottawa, January 28, 2013 – The mining sector in Canada’s North is forecast to almost double its output and employment by the end of the decade – staggering growth compared to the Canadian economy as a whole. Achieving this outcome, however, depends on greater efforts by industry, governments and communities to address key issues including infrastructure, regulatory uncertainty, skills shortages and Aboriginal rights, according to a Centre for the North report, The Future of Mining in Canada’s North.

The Conference Board of Canada forecasts that Canada’s overall northern metal and non-metallic mineral output will grow by 91 per cent from 2011 to 2020, a compound annual growth rate of 7.5 per cent. In contrast, the Canadian economy is forecast to grow by an average of just 2.2 per cent annually over this period.

The annual gross domestic product of mining in the north, which was $4.4 billion in 2011, is expected to reach $8.5 billion in 2020 (both figures in constant 2002 dollars).

In recent years, the Northwest Territories’ economy has been tied to the fortunes of the diamond mining industry. In 2007, industry output and employment peaked at almost $1.3 billion and a workforce of 2,200. The recession led to a sharp decline in diamond demand, and output will continue to decline through 2013. A revival in production at Diavik in 2014 and the beginning of operations at Gahcho Kue will mitigate some of the decline in output.

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