Belgian group Umicore (UMI.BR: Quote) forecast improved earnings this year due to strong demand for its automotive catalysts and improved supply for its precious metal recycling business. The metals and speciality materials maker said on Tuesday it expected 2011 operating profit (recurring earnings before interest and tax) to rise to 400-425 million euros ($559-$594 million) from 342 million last year.

Japan's output of rolled copper product fell 3.7 percent in March from a year earlier, its biggest fall in 17 months, after the March 11 earthquake devastated the northeast of the country and disrupted supply chains of automakers, which are big consumers of copper parts.

Northland Resources has contracted Metso to supply the mineral processing equipment and services for the two processing lines at Northland’s Kaunisvaara iron ore project in northern Sweden. The order is valued at $293 million and covers the complete equipment package for the processing plant, including two primary gyratory crushers, two AG mills, seven vertical grinding mills (VTM 3000), magnetic separators and seven VPA press filters.

Has world top gold miner, Barrick Gold, given up on its principles to remain predominantly a gold producer? While the copper content of Barrick's business has been growing in recent years as the acquisition and development of some of its biggest new gold projects involve the co-mining of copper from big gold/copper porphyry type orebodies, today's announced agreement to acquire copper miner Equinox seems designed to move it even more into the polymetallic production space.

A nickel mine in northern Manitoba will start producing again after a 6-month suspension of operations due to a dispute over contractors, […]

Thompson Creek Minerals has spurned an option with U.S. Energy Corp. to acquire an interest in the Mount Emmons molybdenum project in Colorado's Gunnison County. According to a story in today's Globe and Mail, the Denver-based company has decided instead to focus on exploring its Berg property in British Columbia: Chairman and CEO Kevin Loughrey said the property can potentially expand its molybdenum production while also helping the company's diversification efforts.

In the last 25 years, the percentage of Aboriginal workers in Rio Tinto's Australian workforce has gone from 0.5 to 8. Today, The Australian reports, the company is believed to be the biggest private-sector employer of indigenous Australians.

At the company’s Argyle diamond mine in the Kimberley, for example, almost 25 per cent of the workforce is Aboriginal. In the booming iron ore country of the Pilbara, where 13 per cent of the population is Aboriginal, Rio aims to lift indigenous employment by 1 per cent a year.

Peregrine Diamonds Ltd. ("Peregrine" or "the Company") (TSX:PGD) is pleased to report the discovery of the CH-51 kimberlite by core drilling on the Chidliak project ("Chidliak") on Baffin Island, Nunavut, Canada. CH-51 is the first target drilled in 2011 and the fifty-first kimberlite discovered at Chidliak since 2008. CH-51 is located approximately 200 metres south of the CH-17 kimberlite, ten kilometres south of the CH-28 kimberlite and 40 kilometres north of the Southern Focus Area. Currently, CH-28 and six kimberlites within the Southern Focus Area have characteristics consistent with economic potential in Arctic settings.

Quest Rare Minerals Ltd. (TSX VENTURE:QRM) is pleased to report that its Board of Directors has approved funding for a pre-feasibility study […]