RE: A glance at what Sonora holds for BCN18 May 2021 17:09
Yes, I took the opportunity yesterday to put some money into SQM. Potential investors in Mexico should get to know national Senator Alejandro Armenta Mier, from President Lopez Obrador’s governing party, who wants to nationalize the lithium industry as Mexico did with the oil industry in the lifetime of older Mexican political leaders. He told his fellow legislators last month that “lithium is essential for Mexico to achieve its Energy Sovereignty.”
Armenta Mier has criticized the lack of attention paid to lithium by his country. “Today there is no government institution that can tell you the characteristics of the rock, the clay of the subsoil, the surface or the depth where the lithium is found,” he says. And he adds that “if we want to know something about lithium we have to ask the Chinese, we have to ask the Canadians, the Koreans. Because there is no institute that is investigating the most important input in the world in the energy transition.”
A major barrier to mining in Mexico is the lack of security, according to an article in the Mexico City newspaper El Sol from January 2020.
“The insecurity that plagues Mexico could become one of the main obstacles to developing the local lithium extraction and production industry after the discovery of an important deposit in the north of the country, according to a mining sector specialist.”
The article quotes Sergio Almazán, who from 2004 to 2019 directed the Mining Chamber of Mexico (Camimex). "The outlook is looking good for Mexico (but) security, as in all industry, not only in mining, is a problem that we have to solve in the country," said Almazán, "Mining investors are always looking for the best characteristics to invest in (and) undoubtedly one of the issues they observe is the issue of security," he added.
It reports “Mining, which contributes 3.8% to local GDP, has suffered the attacks of crime. Two months ago, a truck carrying gold bars from a Fresnillo mining unit was attacked by an armed commando.
“The lithium deposit, which is estimated to start producing in 2021, is located just over 100 kilometers from the place where in November of last year three women and six children from a Mexican-American Mormon community were shot by alleged members of organized crime. A comment from Bacanora Lithium and Ganfeng could not be immediately obtained.”
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