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Metminco Australian mining company will begin a process of drilling in late 2012 to update the resource estimates in the proposed copper and molybdenum the Galatians, located in Moquegua.

The company expects to complete the update of the estimated resources of the site late next year and only then commissioned a study prefactbilidad project is estimated to require an investment of over $ 2 billion.

Findings

In recent boreholes Metminco said it has made ​​significant BOUT findings, demonstrating that the project has the potential of the Galatians an important reservoir host of red mineral.

The current drill program is designed to provide detailed information and therefore the Australian company expects the project to be world class, similar to mine Escondido in Chile.

So far the project is projected to the Galatians has 926 million tons of ore at 0.39% copper.

Near this site are encuetan three large mines: Cerro Verde, Rennet and Toquepala.

In late June the company was affected by the initial impact was Lolita Humana’s election as president of Peru. So much so that the company reported that its shares fell about 14%, but continue with its program Metminco in the Galatians.

 

The nationalization of copper in 1971 has been one of the most important decisions in the economic and political history of Chile. It occurred in a context of conflict between the interests of foreign mining companies and the country. While Chile sought to use copper mining as its “cornerstone for development”, the domestic industry lost weight on the world market and, worse, the contribution of large-scale mining to the national economy was weak, dominated by perception enclaves that were not able to drive the development of paisley nationalization was a radical response, under a social and political context peculiar to the country’s history, that sought to increase state control in an industry considered strategic. Today it is possible to note that in significant respects, the objectives of nationalization were reasonably achieved. Chilean copper production reversed its downward trend and began a gradual increase from 11% of total world production in 1971 to 17.7% in 1990, which began producing the new era of large-scale private mining.

The other aspect of great importance that the nationalization was allowed the development of national capacities related to mining, mainly through human capital formation, accelerating national technological learning has been sustained not only the production in state hands, but also the great expansion of private mining in Chile since the 90′s. La Corporation del Cobra de Chile (Codec), formed in 1976 to concentrate management sites in a single nationalized company has been a vector of technological development in the country, topping the record of industrial patents. Also through sales management Codec managed to learn and efficiently control the marketing of copper and its byproducts, from a few years to play a leadership role in the global market.

On the other hand, the institutional framework of Codec reported very few changes since its creation, which, along with a diminishing role of the owner, was generating a sub-optimal compromise with their financing needs and insufficient framework for action to address major issues of development, especially in recent years, the world copper market has undergone structural changes which require a faster growth.

That’s why the corporate governance reforms adopted in 2009 are of such historical importance, as they offer a new institutional framework that can help the company overcome its current challenges and push it towards a better future.

Between 1976 and 2010, Codec contributed surplus of over U.S. $ 62 billion, about 12% of the country’s fiscal revenue, which has been a fundamental basis for social action of the state. The big challenge is to empower the company to become the flagship of the internationalization of Chilean mining, maximizing production capacity and efficiency, thus multiplying the contributions he has been able to generate for Chile.

Workers at the giant Codec, the world’s largest producer of copper, on Monday a 24-hour strike to claim against a plan to restructure the mining industry.

The last time Codec operators made a total paralysis was 18 years ago.

Here is a list of major mining strikes in Chile in the last two decades:

- August 1991 – More than 9,500 workers at Codec El Tenanted division remain on strike for nearly a month, halting production of the largest underground copper mine in the world at a cost of $ 450,000 per day.

The same month, workers at Chuquicamata, then the world’s largest copper mine open pit paralyzed chores for two weeks.

- May 1993 – Workers at Codec strike that lasted less than an hour. Had no effect on production.

- February 1995 – Some 1,200 workers at state refiner Venetians copper stop their work for a wage dispute that forced the government to buy copper cathode in the spot market to secure their supplies.

- May 1996 – Chuquicamata miners made an eight-day strike ended May 12.

- April 2003 – Workers in the Candelabra copper mine agreed to end a strike that lasted 16 days after accepting an offer from the company on wages and benefits.

December 2003 – Copper prices up due to a strike of 11 days in Codec’s Adina division by wage demands and bonus payments linked to production.

- August / September 2006 – Escondido, currently the largest copper mine in the world is affected by a 25-day strike by 2052 union workers forced to declare force majeure. The paralysis damaged production and pushed up copper prices in the international market.

- June / July 2007 – Codec signed an agreement to give bonuses and benefits to 14,000 workers in contracting firms serving the state mining company, after a sometimes violent strike that affected the production of the El Tenanted, El Salvador and Adina. Contract workers threatened to extend their protest to the private mining companies, but this did not materialize.

- July 2007 – A four-day strike at Collahuasi causes a rise in international copper prices.

- May 2009 – Workers at the Lomas Bays copper mine, owned by global miner Xstrata, reach a wage agreement with the company and end a stoppage of tasks that lasted nine days.

- November 2009 – Workers at the Spence copper mine, BHP Billiton group, end a strike that lasted 42 days and left a total loss of about 20,500 tons.

- December 2009 – Workers at Xstrata’s Altamonte go on strike after not reach an agreement with the company during its collective bargaining process.

- January 2010 – Union workers at the huge Chuquicamata copper mine started a strike that pushed up copper prices.

- May 2010 – Contract workers blocked the access road to Collahuasi, hitting operations and forcing the company to declare force majeure briefly.

- November 2010 – Workers at Collahuasi plant, a unit controlled by Xstrata and Anglo American, began a strike for higher wages that lasted over a month. This strike is enshrined among the most difficult he has faced a foreign mining in Chile.

- May / June 2011 – Production at Codec’s second largest mine, El Tenanted, is substantially reduced due to a protest by contractors, demanding better wages.

- July 2011 – Thousands of workers in all divisions of Codec made a one-day stoppage in protest at a plan of modernization. The strike will cost the firm to stop producing 4900 tons of copper.