Philippines hoping for a Colombia-like repeat in its mining sector

Brian Truscott | January 30, 2011 | 4:37 pm Base Metals Battery Metals Precious Metals Asia Canada China Cobalt Copper Gold Nickel Silver 

There are more than a few exploration companies drilling holes in the Philippines these days, all with the quiet hope that the country soon finds favour with serious resource investors in the much the same way that Ventana Gold and others became overnight rock stars, if you will, with their projects in Colombia.

Case in point: Vancouver-based Crazy Horse Resources and Mindoro Resources. The latter is hunting for nickel, cobalt, copper and gold. It’s intention: to build a mid-tier mining company right on China’s doorstep. Crazy Horse is working on its recently acquired Taysan copper-gold porphyry project, pushing a $3.5 million work program towards a scoping study and NI43-101 compliant resource estimate.

Chief Executive John Raadsma said during a recent conference in New Orleans that the Taysan copper project is a well drilled out project.

“We purchased (it) from Phelps Dodge when Phelps Dodge was purchased by Freeport [McMoRan Copper & Gold]. The Taysan copper project was considered non-strategic and Freeport has its hands full [with other projects] so we purchased the Taysan Project,” he said.

Crazy Horse hopes to have its initial works program completed this month.

The bottom-line: The Philippine government is keen to develop its mining sector, a capital-intensive industry. It issued more than three dozen exploration permits last year, in a country where chromite, copper, gold, nickel, silver, manganese and magnetite sand can be found in economically feasible quantities ready for extraction.

The government has kicked out some 300 mineral production sharing agreements as well as four financial and technical assistance agreements over the past decade, according to ABS-CBNnews.com.

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Comments

  • Guest

    Hi, I am currently looking for information about the “300 MPSA” which have been kicked out by the governement. Anyone who could help me in giving the real link on the abs-cbnnews website to get the information?

    Thanks

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