Thunder Bay Chronicle-Journal is the daily newspaper of Northwestern Ontario.
National media coverage on the Ring of Fire has been of the doom-and-gloom variety of late, but that doesn’t mean the province should throw in the towel on the idea for a main access road into the remote mineral rich zone.
Not surprisingly, in the wake of falling metal prices right across the globe, pundits and mining industry analysts have been questioning the RoF’s value. Maybe it’s not that rock-solid after all, the thinking goes.
But surely that thinking is flawed. It’s hardly a shock to discover that when mineral prices fall and stock values plummet, companies are no longer in a position to fork out the enormous upfront costs of building new mines.
Not until a mine is up and running is its proponent in a position to make operational changes, including temporary shutdowns, to ride out the industry’s inevitable ups and downs.
A few years ago, North American Palladium wisely shut down its Lac des Iles mine north of Thunder Bay when the price of palladium plunged. It restarted the operation when the price came back up, casting the views of cynics aside.
Fortunes can also lead the other way. Some may remember when Inmet Mining caved on a major expansion at its former Schreiber zinc mine after prices for that mineral crashed. But none of that means the province should abandon a sensible plan to build a main access road into the James Bay lowlands.
We even have a rough idea of what an RoF road would cost because, to be fair to the Liberal government, it once offered to split the $600-million price-tag former RoF proponent Cliffs Natural Resources was prepared to spend on a north-south route.
Presumably the province has cold feet now because it’s loathe, in the absence of a major player like Cliffs, to get stuck with a 350-kilometre road that leads to nowhere. Except that it wouldn’t.
A main trunk route into the heart of the province’s Far North would become a vital link for numerous First Nations that must currently rely on dodgy winter ice roads. It would also set the stage for ramped-up mineral exploration, lowering the cost of bringing in heavy equipment for that purpose.
As we’ve said before on these pages, the fact that Quebec has a paved, year-round road into its remote North, and Ontario doesn’t, remains a glaring omission in this province.
Ontario can blame the federal government for not doing its share in the Ring of Fire all it wants, but it’s up to the province to take the lead on this file, just as Quebec did.
Leaning on the prospects for its RoF development corporation, which is what the province has done so far, falls short and comes off as a dodge.
Inevitably, a road would require delicate negotiations with affected First Nations, but surely that legwork could be incorporated into ongoing talks about land rights generated by the Ring of Fire itself.
And what better legacy for Premier Kathleen Wynne to leave — the first major route into Ontario’s Far North?