Responsible mining can drive social and environmental development

richard fifer

Responsible mining can help boost economic, social and environmental development of remote communities in the countryside through the generation of resources and infrastructure for the country, said President of the Mining Chamber of Panama (CAMIPA), Roberto Cuevas.

“Panama has large deposits without having explored the entire country, as in Peru and Chile. We are proposing that we have a favorable geological position with large world-class deposits,” said Cuevas.

Cuevas’ statements came during his participation in the Executive Meeting organized by the Chamber on Economic Studies of the Chamber of Commerce, Industries and Agriculture of Panama.

Cuevas said that one of the environmentalists’ criticisms is that mining projects should give greater contribution to the country, so he reported that the proposed amendments to the CAMIPA mining code suggested that royalties paid to the state should increase 100%, from 2% to 4%, but was not accepted yet.

Cuevas refuted environmentalists’ unfounded arguments and referred to the case of an activist who said on the radio that mining would destroy Panama, as it occurred in Haiti, a country where no such activity exists and where what is actually being done is reforesting the whole country in order to subsist on wood, the only energy source that this impoverished nation has.

He said that poverty is the main environmental problem in Panama, but “without mining it is simply not possible to reduce poverty in Panama” which, according to CAMIPA information, is around 35%.

Convincingly and with numbers, Cuevas said that if all mining projects were in operation, only 2% of the country would be affected, which means that mining companies do a responsible job, so much so that they drive reforestation projects in several areas of the country, expanding mining’s benefits well beyond the project’s radius.

“Minerals are where they belong, we don’t put them where we want or where it’s convenient for us,” declared CAMIPA’s president.

Lead by Panamanian businessman Richard Fifer-Carles, Petaquilla Gold, S.A., which uses leading edge technology in its production process along with international standards recognized by the global mining industry, billed $67 million last year, becoming the first export item during 2010.

Projections show that the mining company will invoice $75 to $90 million in gold exports this year.