Gruvindustrins betydelse för samhällsutveckling och infrastruktur i Sverige och inte minst i Norrbottens län är mycket stor. De geologiska förutsättningarna att hitta nya brytvärda förekomster i Norrbotten är goda. Länet är tillsammans med Västerbotten en av Europas viktigaste regioner för utvinning av metaller. Det syns också i den nyligen framtagna regionala mineralstrategin för Norrbotten och Västerbotten. Visionen för den regionala mineralstrategin: ”Genom långsiktigt hållbart nyttjande av Norrbottens och Västerbottens läns mineralresurser har ytterligare tillväxt skapats i regionen och hela Sverige. Vi har utvecklat och stärkt vår ställning som ledande gruv- och mineralnation.”Eftersom framtidspotentialen för gruvnäringen är mycket god men okunnigheten hos både allmänhet och beslutsfattare om näringens betydelse för innovation och samhällsutveckling är stor, kopplat med en utbredd oro för miljöpåverkan, måste dessa viktiga framtidsfrågor belysas. Med finansiering från Länsstyrelsen i Norrbotten bedrevs därför under första hälften av 2014 en förstudie som syftade till att sammanfatta kunskapsläget om framtidens gruvindustri i Norrbotten. Resultaten av förstudien redovisas i den här rapporten. En viktig slutsats är att det under nästa strukturfondsperiod (med start 2015) behövs ett framtidsinriktat forskningsprogram för att belysa de möjligheter som finns. Denna förstudie utgör grund för en kommande ansökan till strukturfonderna. Kompetensen som finns vid Luleå tekniska universitet, Sveriges centrum för gruvrelaterad forskning och utbildning, bör användas för att studera troliga framtidsmöjligheter och hur de ska kunna användas för att få en så positiv utveckling som möjligt för länet. Projektet bör innehålla följande tre huvudinriktningar, som naturligtvis hör ihop:Vilka malm- och mineralresurser finns det potential för i Norrbotten, och vilka kommer sannolikt att exploateras i framtiden?Vad kommer den exploateringen att ha för betydelse för innovation och samhällsutveckling?Vad kommer den exploateringen att få för miljöeffekter och hur ska man göra för att minska miljöbelastningen?En annan slutsats är att nedlagda gruvområden inte måste ses som förstörd natur. Betydande mervärden som gruvturism skulle kunna skapas om vilja, kreativitet och beslutsamhet finns. Detta är ett givet utvecklingsområde där småföretag och entreprenörer kan göra stor insats om de politiska och myndighetsmässiga förutsättningarna finns. Dessa aspekter skulle också kunna belysas i det föreslagna forskningsprogrammet eller i ett eget projekt.
The article offers information on the performance of mining exploration during 2008 worldwide. During the last quarter of the year, the industry experienced a major decline when it encountered an abrupt international economic slump, leaving producers and industry vendors nervously peering ahead to assess if the next obstacle would be worse than expected. Because of the economic crisis, there is a quick unraveling of commodity prices, disappearance of credit sources for junior companies and a mass exodus of investors, leaving the mineral exploration funding and activity in a dire situation.
International cooperation and mobility are buzzwords of today’s research and innovation clusters all over the world. These are however not new concepts. The understanding that research and innovation can only thrive in an international and open environment has been in place for at least 300 years in Sweden. All interested and knowledgeable scientists and business developers have been welcomed to push the front of knowledge and the industry forward. The international contacts of Swedish mining education, research and innovation prove that with an open mind and a persistent, long term effort results will come. The roots of mining education and research in Sweden dates back to the 17th century. Initially the focus was on applied research rather than education, but the early efforts also slowly led to important purely scientific results. Swedish metallurgists/chemists have discovered more elements than scientists from any other nation. Over 150 years, from the early 18th century to the end of the 19th century, 20 elements-and among them many industrially important metals — were isolated and described. The ancient Falu copper mine was the logical choice for location of one of the first technical schools in Sweden: “Falu Bergskola” (Falu Mining School), which was set up in 1822. Its first director was precisely one of the chemical scientists engaged in the discovery of new elements. This Mining school was later merged with other existing institutions offering some technical training into “Tekniska Institutet” (the Technical Insitute). This was in 1876 transformed into a technical high school along German models. The Association of Swedish Iron and Steel industry (Jernkontoret in Swedish) was a key supporter and funder of these developments. The new school was called Kungliga Tekniska Högskolan (KTH) in translation Royal Institute of Technology. KTH had 5 departments, including a school of mining science. In 1972 the education of mining engineers was transferred to the newly established Luleå Technical College close to the Arctic Circle. The College was later expanded and in 1997 renamed Luleå University of Technology (LTU). LTU has become one of the leading mining universities in Europe, to a large extent due to the fact that it is situated in the centre of one of Europe’s remaining mining regions. Around 2/3 of all university trained staff employed by Swedish mining has been trained at LTU. But LTU has also had its focus on the mining sector for a long time and in its internal program Mines of the Future it has relentlessly pushed the importance of mining and minerals and demonstrated its ambition to be a leading actor in this area. LTU has been appointed by Swedish government to lead the national education and research in mining. The recent decision by the EU to locate one EIT Raw Materials CLC (Co-location Centre) to Luleå means that the university has been given a similar role also on the EU level. LTU has actively built international links and supported cooperation with other universities within Europe and around the world. The bold and officially stated aim is to become one of the globally leading mining universities.
The implications of the lack of natural resources in China and its implications globally and in Africa in particular are presented. China has quickly become a major producer of many metals and minerals. The country also has a near-monopoly on rare earths, tungsten, and other metals. The specific geological parameters of China, with few high-grade deposits of substance, have to a large extent determined the structure of the Chinese iron ore industry, where small and medium-size mines account for most of the production. The depletion of deposits and declining competitiveness has resulted in a growing share for the larger mines. The average grade of Chinese production is likely to be considerably lower than the 30% often assumed, and the production grade in its major mines is less than 25%. Most major and medium-sized mines are owned and operated by the major steel companies, most of which are state-owned with only a few of the major or medium mines being independent.
Reports of economic crises, investor anxiety and the impact of climate change all help paint a gloomy picture of the future. More optimistic predictions may be met with scorn and accused of lack of 'reality.' Nonetheless, one of the many lessons of history is that accurate factual data provides by far the best basis for discussion of future alternative paths of development, optimistic or otherwise (Raw Materials Database 2012). The objectives of this paper are to show: (1) that positive future trends related to mining and metals are evident (Ericsson and Hodge 2012); and (2) that a number of gloom-laden myths should be refuted.
The green energy transition has been called a transition from a fossil fuel dependency to a metal and mineral dependency. Concerns about the security of future supplies are raised mainly in the EU and the USA with the Critical Raw Materials Act and the Inflation Reduction Act. The perspectives of these policies are centred on the demands created in the industrialised countries. The need for metals to lift billions of poor people out of poverty and to cater for the population growth is often, if not always, left out of the equation. While demand undoubtedly is increasing, the opposition to new mines and new renewable energy supply is strong and perhaps even increasing. It is necessary to find new ways to create a recognition that mining plays a key role for the green transition.
Metal prices remained high due to supportive supply/demand fundamentals, not only in China and India but also in Russia, Kazakhstan, Brazil and others. Metal use is solidly underpinned by both personal demand when standard of living is increasing and infrastructure investments in several countries, not only China and India. The supply response is slow and it will take years to make up for earlier under-investment. But at the same time it is important to underline that mining is and remains a cyclical business. Governance and transparency remain key concepts for all participants, both new and old, in this process. Positive experiences from countries that have successfully developed, economically and socially, based on natural resources should be systematically transferred to weak governments. The same strict demands on transparency, conduct and operational practices from reporting standards to health and safety routines should be put on all exploration and mining companies in principle regardless of origin or size.
The concept of declining availability due to declining primary resource quality has been investigated for various resource categories to try to determine the effort needed in future to either extract the resource or to treat it for intended use. The concept of ‘future efforts’ due to declining primary resource quality is explored by Vieira et al. (2016, 2017). They suggest that a specific burden associated with the production of each primary material should be taken into account and that this can be done by studying the costs of production or ore requirements of the material and by projecting forward likely costs into the future. For the purpose of the analysis, they employ mine cost data for 2000–2013 and reserve data published by the US Geological Survey. We will argue below that this approach is not correct and, with this comment, we wish to make it clear that—contrary to what is suggested in much of the Life Cycle Assessment literature—the future efforts concept is not an established rule of natural resource extraction. For mineral resources, it is quite impossible to proceed with extraction in the ordered way that this approach suggests because nobody has a comprehensive view of the entire natural resource. Secondly, there is no evidence available to support the idea that extracting a mineral resource today causes a decrease in availability of that mineral tomorrow. On the contrary, the weight of evidence suggests that where declines in ore grades have been observed, they are overwhelmingly due to technology development in response to high demand and have been accompanied by increased mining efficiency and increased availability of the resource to successive generations. Grade is a rather arbitrary measure since the grade of mined ore ultimately has to do with the relationship of costs and revenues. It is not only the technology employed which matters but also how smartly this technology is applied. Thirdly, the future efforts approach entirely overlooks the potential availability of mineral materials from secondary (scrap) sources, sources which are expected to become increasingly important to mineral supply in the future. Our conclusion from the discussion is that we as humans have been able to economically access ever-increasing amounts of material from often lower and lower-grade sources. What is impossible to conclude from this is that the environment no longer contains any of the higher-grade sources. In fact, all the available evidence suggests that higher-grade deposits are still out there. We remain critical optimists.
This study was initiated to address the importance of properly functioning African geological surveys. Africa’s current developmental needs require a robust geoscientific infrastructure and knowledge that can only be achieved through well-developed geological surveys. A geoscientific infrastructure covers a wide range of geo-related areas, e.g. geological mapping, geophysical surveys and geochemical analyses that are needed for a variety of purposes, such as exploration, land-use planning, water resource assessment etc. Many geological surveys in Africa lack human, material and economic resources and therefore cannot perform their work effectively. The questionnaire used as a base for this study was made by Danièle Barberis (French) and Susanne Gylesjö (English). Compilation of the data and the report was performed by Susanne Gylesjö with assistance from Magnus Ericsson.
The unprecedented mineral and metal boom beginning in 2004/5 and peaking in 2011 exposed European economic vulnerability and the continent's high dependence on imported raw materials. The almost limitless Chinese appetite for metals and minerals together with Chinese control over certain metals of strategic importance (nowadays called critical metals), such as the rare earths, further exacerbated the situation. European politicians and bureaucrats were caught unaware of the seemingly low security of supply for European industry. Not surprising, as during the two last decades of the twentieth century, the European Commission had been trying to limit damages caused by the crumbling European mining sector, primarily coal but also other minerals and metals, and had not been thinking about future supply issues at all. But since then the Commission has slowly but steadily revved its mineral raw material policies into action. The European actions are carried out under a range of acronyms, and for the non-European reader, it might be useful to present these in some detail, with a focus on R&I (research & innovation) aspects, as a background to this issue of Mineral Economics.
EM&J's annual survey of global mining investment in the year 2010 is presented. During 2010, 105 new mining investment projects with total announced costs of $60 billion were registered in Raw Materials Data Metals Mines/Projects database. The RMD Metals database includes approximately 1,800 projects, mostly in the conceptual stage, for which no investment figure has been announced. In 2010, six new silver projects were announced with a total investment of more than $4 billion, while political interest in rare earths also resulted in four new projects outside China with a total investment of more than $3 billion. Australia became the leading country for mining investors, of the 20 largest projects in Australia, 11 are for iron ore and all require investment of more than $1 billion.
E & MJ has conducted an annual survey of global mining investment and reported that less than 100 new mining investments projects, with a total projected cost of just $32 billion, were added to RMG's project database in 2009. The report states that strong demand for metals and high prices for gold, copper and iron ore will lead to significant project investment toward the end of 2010. It reveals that total funding in the global mining industry's project pipeline, according to RMG's database, was $465 billion at the end of 2009. The investment value of projects under construction increased in 2009 to $50 billion, compared with $37 billion in 2008. The report states that among the new projects listed by RMG during 2009, gold accounts for more than 28% of the value of all new projects, uranium accounts for 5% and nickel represents 3% of the total investment for new projects.
E&MJ conducted an annual survey of global investment in the mining sector in 2008. The survey revealed that global economic crisis had an adverse effect on investments in the sector. It revealed that only 158 new mining investment projects with an estimated total cost of $81 billion were registered in Raw Materials Group's Raw Materials Data Metals (RMD) Metals) Mines and Projects database during 2008. It was observed that the mining sector recorded significant growth in 2006, with 200 new projects, while investments in new projects started declining during 2008, due to decreasing metal prices. The RMD metals database also revealed that the total investment in the industry's potential projects amounted to $409 billion during the year. Updated project costs revealed that the trend of increasing costs continued to increase as noticed earlier.
Analysis of a number of indicators points towards a turn around in metals market during 2017 after several rough years. The past years certainly were disastrous in terms of the depth of the fall, but it must not be forgotten that the downturn started from an extreme high whether in 2011 or earlier. During 2016 all prices for metals produced in the EU have improved. The industry's market valuation is slowly improving. At the peak in the first half of 2011 the market capitalization of just short of 2500 bn USD. In 2016 the mining companies had lost 2/3 of their market value and were around 750 bn only. During the first years of the super cycle, European politicians and Commission bureaucrats were caught unaware of the strong foreign dependency of the metal supply for European industry. In absolute terms, copper production has increased by 10% from 2000 to 894 kt in 2014. Zinc production has fallen by a little less to 840 kt in the same period. European equipment manufacturers seem to have been increasing their market shares in recent years of downturn in total investments when productivity has been in focus not only volumes.
'. Preliminary figures of global iron ore and steel production in 2020 show a slight decline. The article reviews iron ore production by global companies (Vale, Rio Tinto, BHP, FMG, Anglo American, etc.) in 2019 and 2020, as well as production figures by the leading steel producing countries (China, India, Japan, Russia, USA, South Korea) in 2020. Iron ore imports and exports are also analyzed. It is noted that the global iron ore exports had increased by around 43% over the previous decade, however, they went down by 1.7% in 2019, and this decline in exports continued in 2020. Australia is the largest iron ore exporter with a market share of 55%; this share increased by one percentage point in 2020 compared to the previous year. Green-field projects by global producing companies are presented in Brazil, Australia and other countries. A conclusion is made that despite a 3.5% decline in the global economy forecast by the International Monetary Fund in 2020, it is possible to acknowledge that the iron ore market is well balanced. However, if steel demand and steel production volumes increase unexpectedly and some of the planned new mines are not commissioned, the surplus can quite promptly turn into a deficit. In the long term, the plans to produce steel without using fossil fuels, without coke and therefore without CO2 emissions, could revolutionize the iron ore market and increase the demand for products with a high iron content.
The world’s dependency on cobalt mines in Congo and cobalt refineries in China is seen as serious security issues with potentially dangerous implications for the energy transition. However, Chinese refineries have a similar supply security issue as most of its cobalt concentrates are imported. Most supply security studies take a country perspective on market concentration and supply risks. However, control of the mines and refineries lies with the producing companies, not the governments of the countries where they are located. This paper analyses the corporate structure of the cobalt industry at the mine and the refinery stages over a longer time period to establish changes in the level of corporate concentration and to put the situation in 2018 in perspective. The level of corporate concentration at the mine stage is low and does not raise concerns for market failures or a lack of competitiveness. Corporate concentration of refined cobalt depends on the Chinese government’s influence over Chinese production: if the state control over individual refineries is assumed to be strong, the corporate concentration is high. Mine stage supply security could be strengthened by improving the general political stability in the DRC to make the country more attractive for investors other than the present ones. Increased local beneficiation would strongly benefit Congo and reduce China’s influence. This is a long and complicated process and its success is not at all certain. At the refinery stage, the solution is much easier: reliability of supply could be improved by constructing refineries in countries outside China.
The first objective of this paper is to update earlier assessments of mineral dependence in lower-income countries. In 2018, the mining of metals and coal continued to be an important contributor to the economies of several low- and middle-income countries. As in our previous calculations of the Mining Contribution Index, African countries in particular benefit from this fact. When oil and gas are also included in estimates of export dependence on extractive industries, a number of new countries appear among those with the greatest dependence—again mostly African countries. The second objective of this paper is to analyse the opportunities for developing countries of the present global transition to a world less dependent on fossil fuels. This process, it can be argued, is partly a transition from hydrocarbons to metals. Hence, countries with reserves of metals and minerals necessary for the low-carbon future, and in particular those with an existing mining industry, will be best positioned to take advantage of this transition. In this category are several African countries, including Burkina Faso, Côte D’Ivoire, DRC, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. In Asia there are Kyrgyzstan, Papua New Guinea, and Philippines, while in South America Bolivia is the only country.
In several low- and middle-income countries rich in non-fuel mineral resources, mining makes significant contributions to national economic development as measured by the revised Mining Contribution Index (MCI-Wr). Ten countries among the 20 countries where mining contributes most (highest MCI-Wr score) have moved up one or two steps in the World Bank’s country classification between 1996 and 2016. In particular, African countries have benefitted. Socio-economic development indicators also show signs of progress for African mineral-rich countries. This paper provides an update and expansion of an earlier study within the framework of the United Nations University (UNU) World Institute for Development Economics Research (WIDER) initiative Extractives for Development. Based on the detailed data available for the sector, such as production, export, prices, mineral rents, exploration expenditure and government revenues, an analysis is carried out of the current situation for 2016, and trends in mining’s contribution to economic development for the years 1996–2016. The contribution of minerals and mining to GDP and exports reached a maximum at the peak of the mining boom in 2011. Naturally, the figures for mining’s contribution had declined for most countries by 2016, but importantly the levels were still considerably higher than in 1996. The results of this survey contradict the widespread view that mineral resources create a dependency that might not be conducive to economic and social development. In addition, this paper presents an attempt to use already available socio-economic indicators for African mineral-rich countries to measure socio-economic developments. One preliminary conclusion of this survey is that mining countries perform better than oil-producing countries and non-mineral countries in Africa as measured by these indices of human development and governance.
In several low- and middle-income countries rich in non-fuel mineral resources, mining makes significant contributionsto national economic development as measured by the revised Mining Contribution Index (MCI-Wr). 10 countries among the20 countries where mining contribute most (highest MCI-Wr score) have moved up one or two steps in the World Bank’s countryclassification between 1996 and 2016. In particular African countries have benefitted. This paper provides an up-date andexpansion of an earlier study within the framework of the United Nations University (UNU) World Institute for DevelopmentEconomics Research (WIDER) initiative Extractives for Development. Based on the detailed data available for the sector, suchas production, export, prices, mineral rents, exploration expenditure and government revenues an analysis is carried out of thecurrent situation for 2016, and trends in mining’s contribution to economic development for the years 1996-2016. The contributionof minerals and mining to GDP and exports reached a maximum at the peak of the mining boom in 2011. Naturally the figuresfor mining’s contribution had declined for most countries by 2016, but importantly the levels were still considerably higher thanin 1996. The results of this survey contradict the widespread view that mineral resources create a dependency that might not beconducive to economic and social development.
Chinese companies are far from taking control over African or global mining. In 2018, they control less than 7% of the value of total African mine production. Chinese investments in African mining of non-fuel minerals between 1995 and 2018 have contributed to production growth but it has also increased Chinese control over African mineral and metal production. There is evidence pointing to a continued Chinese expansion in African minerals and metals but at a slower pace than in the past decade. Through a detailed analysis of every mine, fully or partially controlled by Chinese interest in Africa and all other parts of the world the paper also measures total Chinese control over global mine production to be around 3% of the total value.
The platinum group mining industry is among the most concentrated of all metal mining industries. The Herfindahl-Hirschman Index for palladium is 2413 in 2014, on the threshold to what is defined as “highly concentrated”. When considering that production is also concentrated in a few countries, more than 80 % of total world production is mined in South Africa and Russia, it is obvious that platinum group metals (PGMs) are labelled “critical” by many governments such as the EU, Japan and the USA (EU Commission 2014; National Research Council 2008; Prime Minister of Japan 2015). The development of the corporate structure for PGMs is analysed. Into the future, it looks as if the degree of concentration will decrease.