Columbia is more violence prone than Ekwadoria. About 4 times so. Ekwardoia enjoys, iffen u kn cl it thet, 16 murders per 100K population.
On the other hand, If you can avoid the slash and burn choppity chop, the guvernmentals of Columbia do not want ALL your money, that you might make in the mining business. And they have done very well in quelling violenzia in the past 10 years. They used to have 3600 kidnappings per year. That rate is down to 800 now. Well 800 is no picnic, no? It is all part of that pesky 40 year old marxist rebellion. Relatively quiet these days, but still a tad of a problemo.
The Highest marginal personal tax rate in Columbia is 35% and the corporate tax rate is 33% flat. The government wanted to bring it down to 12.5% but were rebuked by treasury. They do have free trade zones at 15% tax however. How does that stack up against Ekwadore? Hey! It has Canada beat all to $#@%@#%.
Columbia wants your business. Risky. Well yes. Worth it. It depends on whether you like people burning your bulldozer in Canada, and no police at all effectively and 5 years to start a mine maybe, or start the mine next year in Columbia and hire some additional security.
Your call. I hate to think Dynasty is wasting its time, but I would not even begin to look at a mine in Bolivia, Venezuela for obvious reasons, Ecuador, perhaps Peru. Despite their strong mining background in Brazil, it has problemos in property owhership and politics. Argentina has too many crazies out to kill your project in and out of office. Actually Chile is good, but their main minerals are not that great. However they do have gold in certain areas. Barrick and Argentina gold proved that.
EC<:-} |
