Barker Minerals Ltd. (TSX-V:BML) reported results from the 2,000m trenching program on its silver/gold/lead Black Bear project. The 100% owned project on China Mountain is located 74 km northeast of Williams Lake, in the Cariboo region of British Columbia.

Cole Latimer of Australian Mining reports that Minara Resources, Australia's second-largest nickel producer, is looking to increase the number of women on its mines to address the skills shortage.

Minara says about 30% of its current workforce are women.

The miner’s human resources manager Peter Bourne told the ABC that a number of campaigns are kicking off to encourage more women into mining.

“There's a lot of good work going on, I know the chamber of minerals and energy in Perth have promoted it through their women in mining celebrations recently," Bourne said.

Newmont Nusa Tenggara, a unit of U.S. gold miner Newmont Mining Corp , plans to launch an initial public offering in the second half of this year, said Martiono Hadianto, the firm's president director, on Tuesday.

Southern Copper, one of the world's largest producers of the metal, has postponed its $1 billion Tia Maria mining project in Peru because of social conflicts, Chief Executive Oscar Gonzalez said on Tuesday. The company (SCCO.N: Quote) will revise the project's viability later this month and consider alternative sites in Argentina and Ecuador in the meantime, Gonzalez told local television.

Copper is the most favoured base metal in BlackRock's $17 billion World Mining Trust, fund manager Evy Hambro said on Tuesday, with the demand and supply outlook keeping prices of the metal resiliently high. At just under 20 percent, copper is the single largest weighting on a pure commodity basis in the fund, Hambro told an Association of Investment Companies roundtable in London.

Ecuador expects companies including Canada's Kinross Gold to invest $7 billion in gold and copper projects in the next seven years, as the OPEC member tries to diversify its economy by encouraging mining. Natural Resources Minister Wilson Pastor said on Tuesday five projects will be signed in the next few months.

Top global miner BHP Billiton has moved into the feasibility study stage of preparing a long-awaited expansion of the Olympic Dam copper and uranium mine in South Australia.

Leighton Holdings subsidiaries Thiess and Leighton Contractors have announced three important new contracts. Thiess has secured a $166 million contract to provide bulk earth works and selected infrastructure for BHP Billiton Iron Ore’s Jimblebar mine near Newman in Western Australia.

Lundin Mining and Inmet Mining late Tuesday called it a day regarding their proposed friendly merger with a kindly farewell: "We continue to think very highly of each other's assets and wish each other well."