The risk cuts both ways - just as miners risk loss of capital due to arbitrary political decisions in re a project, the locals risk the fouling of their air, poisoning of their water, abusive labour practises, etc ... in developing countries they can also be risking loss of sovereignty, of the right to self-determination, when handing out sizable mining concessions that tend to concentrate financial power, and thusly political power, in small groups of self-serving hands .... the locals of a mining area are no more monolithic than are the companies vying to operate there, so some factions will gain by any single decision, and some will lose, this is almost always true
Some companies are better able to adapt to realities on the ground than are others ..... here's a puff piece on pdg's story to date in RSA - #reply-19656667 .... if that's a reasonable overall representation of their act there, then good on em ..... when i first got interested in ngt/aas/Mulatos, the only major point on which i contacted management was regarding their attitude to dealing with locals .... not all insiders passed the test with flying colours, the ones who now remain did, however .... there could easily be formidable political risk generated internally within the company, as they permitted their arrogance to show, this can be deadly in a lot of places ... miners absolutely must have on staff people with long-term association with local culture and language, and they must consistently leave areas better off for their operations there .... it's very much in our financial interest as speculators to monitor this closely, look for independent news on it as well, not just accept everything filtered through the company's perspective ...... example, Manhattan man.to, it was probably possible to foretell that decision well ahead of time by simply having an independent reporter hang around Tambogrande for a while as a 'tourist', and get a feel for the actual situation on the ground .... could have saved a lot of people a lot of money, and i betcha there were smart folk who did this, and neglected to tell the rest of us |
