Facts.....14 Mar 2019 14:24
Extract from the "legal expertise" link:
The international awards that Ecuador received in the past year confirm the success of the mining industry in Ecuador. The Mines & Money Americas Outstanding Achievement Awards 2017 handed out awards for the Best Country of the Year to Ecuador; Best Explorer in Latin America to SolGold; and CEO of the Year to Nick Mather, CEO of SolGold. Additionally, Mines & Money gave an award to Ecuador as the Most Innovative Country, in London in December 2017. On top of that, the Mining Journal included the name of the former Minister of Mining, Javier Cordova, as one of the most influential people in mining around the world.
These awards are not a coincidence. They are the combination of adequate government decisions and the extraordinary results of mining companies, which has placed Ecuador in the sights of investors.
According to the Mining Ministry, from the opening of the mining cadastre on 1 March 2016 to December 2017, 275 mining concessions were granted, equivalent to 3.72 per cent of the national territory, with committed exploration investments during the first four years of approximately US$1.3 billion. These figures are impressive for a country that during the past 10 years was not on the radar of the international investment community. Additionally, there is the arrival in some cases, and the return in others, of various experienced companies, such as BHP Billiton, Anglo American, Newcrest and Fortescue, among others.
However, the most important mining news is without a doubt the extraordinary results of the Cascabel project of Australian company SolGold, which indicate the existence of a world-class porphyry copper-gold deposit that, according to experts, is only discovered once every 10 years around the world.
According to SolGold, the investment required to develop the Cascabel project is projected (using a conceptual economic model with a processing capacity of 40MTPA using the block cave mining method) at US$3 billion capital expenditure, comprising one-third equity and two-thirds debt. An investment of this magnitude would surely affect the GDP of Ecuador, creating new jobs and fostering economic growth, especially in the provinces of Imbabura and Carchi, where the project is located, and in the province of Esmeraldas, home to the port used for exporting the mineral.
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