Minerals and Mining - Burma (general articles and analyses)

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Websites/Multiple Documents

Description: About 15,800,000 results (10 December 2017)
Source/publisher: Google
Date of entry/update: 2017-12-10
Grouping: Websites/Multiple Documents
Language: English
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Description: Abiut 8,000 results (10 December 2017)
Source/publisher: "Myanmar Times" via Google
Date of entry/update: 2014-12-21
Grouping: Websites/Multiple Documents
Language: English
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Description: 295 results, December 2012; 327 results, December 2014, 349 (December 2017)
Source/publisher: Mines and Comminities
Date of entry/update: 2012-12-17
Grouping: Websites/Multiple Documents
Language: English
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Description: The Mines and Communities Website ("MAC") was initiated by members of the Minewatch Asia-Pacific London support group. Its main aim is to ensure easy access to materials published by the group, as well as partner organisations and individuals. We want to make information on mining impacts, projects, and the corporate sector more widely available. Above all, we hope to empower mining-affected communities, so that they can better fight against damaging proposals and practices. The website is supported by: JATAM (Mining Advocacy Network, Indonesia), Mines, Minerals and People (India), Minewatch Asia Pacific Project (Philippines), Partizans (People against Rio Tinto Zinc and Its Subsidiaries, UK), Philippine Indigenous Peoples Links (UK), the Society of St. Columban (UK) and Third World Network Ghana. These organisations are also represented on the editorial group which will submit and monitor new information and contacts on which this website can build......See the Country page for several dozen articles and reports on mining in Burma. MAC is one of the homes of "Grave Diggers: A Report on Mining in Burma" by Roger Moody.
Source/publisher: Mines and Communities
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Websites/Multiple Documents
Language: English
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Description: Situated in South East Asia Peninsula, covering an area of 676578 sq km, Myanmar is endowed with rich mineral resources in which mining of precious minerals date as for back as second century BC. Myanmar Rubies, Sapphires and Jade are admired around the world. Silver Lead and Zinc were extracted since 15 century AD and Myanmar stood as one of the leading exporters of tin and tungsten in the world market during 1930?s. "Ministry of Mines is responsible for Formulation of Mining Policy, Exploration and Extraction of Minerals and Gems. Department of Mines is responsible for Mining Policy Formulation, Granting of Mineral Permits and Coordination of Mining Sector. Mining Enterprise No. 3 is responsible for production of Coal. Department of Geological Surveys and Mineral Exploration is responsible for exploration of Coal Deposits."
Source/publisher: Myanmar Ministry of Mines
Date of entry/update: 2010-08-19
Grouping: Websites/Multiple Documents
Language: English
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Description: 650 results (December 2014); 1,370 (10 December 2017)
Source/publisher: Democratic Voice of Burma via Google
Date of entry/update: 2014-12-21
Grouping: Websites/Multiple Documents
Language: English
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Description: 3,730 results (December 2014); 3,500 9DECEMBER 2017)
Source/publisher: "The Irrawaddy" via Google
Date of entry/update: 2014-12-21
Grouping: Websites/Multiple Documents
Language: English
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Description: The USGS "Minerals Yearbook" contains an annual report on the minerals industry of Burma.
Source/publisher: US Geological Survey (USGS)
Date of entry/update: 2014-12-21
Grouping: Websites/Multiple Documents
Language: English
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Individual Documents

Sub-title: The toxic rare earth mining industry at the heart of the global green energy transition
Description: "China has long dominated the world's supply of heavy rare earths, minerals needed to build electric vehicles and wind turbines. Demand for these products is skyrocketing as we rush to meet climate goals, but there is a problem at the root of the supply chain. The processes used to extract heavy rare earths are highly polluting, ravaging landscapes and poisoning waterways. As concerns over the environmental toll of extraction have grown in China over the past decade, more and more domestic mines have been shut down. Yet global demand is growing rapidly, and China remains the world's largest processor. But with many of its own mines now closed, where is China's supply of these minerals coming from? A six-month investigation by Global Witness followed the outsourcing of this highly toxic industry across the Chinese border into Myanmar. There, heavy rare earth mining has exploded so quickly that within just a few years a mountainous corner of Myanmar, known as Kachin Special Region 1, has become the world's largest source of supply. This region is a semi-autonomous territory run by militias that are affiliated to Myanmar's brutal military regime. The mining is illegal under Myanmar's laws, and hardly exists on paper. Yet the damage that global demand for products manufactured by international companies is fuelling in this remote, lawless part of the world is all too real for the communities who are now risking their lives to defend their land. LEACHING MYANMAR'S MOUNTAINS For Zau*, a local worker, the mining boom is a rare chance to make money. He is paid 3,800 yuan ($600) in cash every month, around twice the average salary in Myanmar. He works in the shadows, at a mine near the Chinese border, for a company that has no permits. On paper, Sin Kyaing Company is owned by a local militia leader called Lagwi Bawm Lang. But like other Burmese companies in the rare earth mining industry, it is really a front for illegal investment by Chinese businesspeople. Zau's job is to remove vegetation and drill holes into the mountains. Then ammonium sulphate solution is injected into the holes, effectively liquefying the earth. Once the chemicals have percolated through the mountainside, the solution is drained into bright blue collection pools, where minerals are precipitated out in a process called in-situ leaching. After this mountain has been leached, Zau and his colleagues will abandon the contaminated site, moving to the next place and starting all over again. “In my opinion, the mountains will definitely collapse one day,” Zau told Global Witness, alluding to the risk of landslides. Despite being paid well, he is worried about the harm the chemicals are causing to the water supply, and therefore to the health of local people. “People from the surrounding villages are facing difficulties getting drinking water,” he said. “Even healthy people like us feel dizzy if we inhale these odours for a long time.” The mountains beneath Zau's feet are rich in ores of dysprosium and terbium, the two most valuable of the heavy rare earth metals. Described by an industry expert as “basically irreplaceable”, we rely on them for a whole range of clean energy and smart tech products – from the smartphone you may be using to read this story, to your energy-conserving home electronics. But their most important use, representing 90% of their value, is in permanent magnets, which are needed to make motors and generators for electric vehicles and wind turbines. The stakes are high: it would be almost impossible to build a low-carbon future without these products, and many of them currently do not work well without heavy rare earths..."
Source/publisher: "Global Witness" (London)
2022-08-09
Date of entry/update: 2022-08-09
Grouping: Individual Documents
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Description: "The world’s biggest jade mines are found in the restive Kachin state in Myanmar. BBC Burmese gained rare access to area where mountains have been turned into moonscapes. The industry has been estimated to be valued at a staggering $31bn (£25bn) annually. Hundreds of thousands of people have flocked to the area to scavenger among the rubble left over from the mine – hoping to get find fragments of the stone. It’s a dangerous job and heroin addiction among the miners and scavengers is epidemic..."
Creator/author:
Source/publisher: "BBC"
2019-09-13
Date of entry/update: 2019-09-13
Grouping: Individual Documents
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Description: "This History Thread is about mining of an array of minerals in Burma (Myanmar) where the geology features varied north-south belts of ores that have long been exploited and exported without protection for environment or workers. Burma trade routes for gems and metals including lead and silver date back to ancient times. #Shan ruby mines were known in 6th Century. #Kachin jadeite was first significantly traded to China (where it would become the obsession of Emperors) in 1784. 1886 British troops took Mogok ruby mines. British surveyed southern Burma tin deposits 1888-1912. Bawdwin, Namtu Shan St. (mined from 15th C. by Chinese) under British exported silver, lead, zinc; future US President Hoover mining engineer there. WW2 Japanese held Bawdwin..."
Creator/author:
Source/publisher: "Project Maje"
2019-04-24
Date of entry/update: 2019-09-02
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language:
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Sub-title: A poor community cites decades of land dispossession and environmental degradation in their opposition to a Thai-operated tin mine in rural Dawei Township.
Description: "ON THE BANKS of a narrow stream in rural Tanintharyi Region, a faded blue sign points the way to Myaung Phyo village. Walking into the village, Frontier could see dying coconut trees lining the main street – a symptom, locals said, of groundwater contamination. Myaung Phyo is located 43 kilometres from Dawei, the capital of Tanintharyi Region, in Myitta sub-township. Close by is the Heinda tin mine, one of Myanmar’s oldest. Local residents say that Myaung Phyo has borne the brunt of the extensive environmental damage caused by the mine. The dispute between the community and the mine operators goes back several decades. In 1983, about 500 village residents were relocated to make way for the mine. The only compensation they received were plots of land smaller than those they were forced to vacate, according to a report by the Dawei Pro Bono Lawyers Network. Ma Phyu Phyu Khaing was one of those displaced. “The situation made us very sad. The village was very peaceful and it had big trees that gave us shade. Neighbouring villages really liked it, because it was very cool. But one side of the village is now dead,” she said. In 2008, heavy rainfall caused flooding that saw the mine’s sediment pools overflow and mining waste wash into the village, contaminating the water supply and destroying plantations and homes, residents say. Further flooding occurred in 2012, damaging about 20 acres of plantations as well as 27 homes. Myaung Phyo resident Daw Khin San said that, because of the mine, many such as herself do not have access to clean water in the village. “All homes have wells, but we can’t use them anymore because of contamination. We have to collect water from a well that is more than two furlongs [half a kilometre] from home. We use this water for drinking, washing and other domestic uses every day,” she said. The Heinda mine was established in the 1920s during British colonial rule, as part of a cluster of tin mines close to Dawei, known then as Tavoy. However, much of the tin and tungsten mining infrastructure was destroyed during World War Two. The industry was nationalised under the military-backed, socialist regime of General Ne Win, which took over in 1962. After decades of low output under the Ministry of Mines, in 1999 Thai company Myanmar Pongpipat was granted permission to explore the mine, in partnership with the state-owned No.2 Mining Enterprise, the former holding 65 percent and the latter 35 pc of the venture. The mine covers 247 acres within an 2,110-acre concession and includes three open-pit mines that produce between 400 and 500 tonnes of tin and tungsten each year, much of which is then exported for processing in China, Thailand and Malaysia, typically earning more than US$4 million per year. Water tests commissioned in 2013 and 2014 by the Dawei Pro Bono Lawyers Network found that lead and arsenic toxicity levels were significantly beyond the safe upper limits recommended by the World Health Organization for drinking water. The network’s report cited significant health risks, especially for children. Another Myaung Pyo resident, Daw Aye, said that the company had promised government officials that they would address the water contamination, but never took any action. The Tanintharyi Region government has suspended the company’s mining activities three times since June 2016, for periods ranging from three weeks to several months, because of environmental concerns. The most recent suspension was in February 2018, but work was allowed to resume in October. Nine residents filed a lawsuit in 2014 at the Dawei District Court against the company for damages caused by the loss of livelihood, but this and subsequent appeals at the Tanintharyi Region High Court and the Union Supreme Court were all rejected. Villagers say that the company had offered them compensation but the sums were too small for them to accept. Some residents whose lands were contaminated by the mine’s runoff were provided with new land, the villagers said. But not everyone accepted it, with some deciding to move to Thailand to seek work instead. Residents also submitted a complaint to the National Human Rights Commission of Thailand in February 2017. The NHRCT said that same month that they would submit a complaint to the Thai government on the villagers’ behalf, but the villagers were not aware of anything having been done in response. Representatives for Myanmar Pongpipat could not be reached for comment. U Thein Soe, deputy permanent secretary at the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Conservation, told Frontier that the ministry’s Environmental Conservation Department and the No.2 Mining Enterprise were supervising the mine to ensure Myanmar Pongpipat was following an environmental management plan the company had commissioned, even though his department had yet to formally approve the plan. He added that data on sediment from the mine was reported to Nay Pyi Taw once a week. Asked about the flooding risks, Thein Soe said it was difficult to “prevent a natural disaster” but added that the situation had “improved” since the government began monitoring mine activities, with the sediment pond now less prone to overflowing. U Ye Aung, a member of a community group formed to monitor the mine at the request of the regional government, told Frontier, “They want to have their creek, good water and trees back, and regain their lost lifestyle. Now, they feel like they, the villagers, don’t matter to the government.” Ye Aung said the monitoring group had submitted three letters to the regional government, calling on it to punish the company for breaching its environmental commitments. Tanintharyi Region Minister for Natural Resources and Environmental Conservation U Myint Maung said the current contract for the mine expires in June. He said the regional government had urged the Union government to open a tender for the new contract and consult independent experts over the terms to set, but that the Union government had asked them to extend the contract for Myanmar Pongpipat for another five years. Daw Aye said she wanted the company to leave. “I’m always sad when I see the [dying] trees. We don’t want the company to be given an extension. If they do, things will only get worse,” she said..."
Creator/author:
Source/publisher: Frontier Myanmar
2019-03-11
Date of entry/update: 2019-07-11
Grouping: Individual Documents
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Description: "... In February 2011 media outlets worldwide reported that China had surpassed Thailand as the largest foreign investor in Myanmar.1 China had US$8.25 billion of approved investment in fiscal year 2010?11 (which in Myanmar runs April to March), all for projects in the extractive and power sectors. It was the biggest investor in Myanmar?s FY2010?11 Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) windfall of almost $20 billion — more than the previous twenty years combined.2 This was just slightly higher than Vietnam?s approved investments for the corresponding fiscal year, which totalled $19.9 billion.3 Yet the 2010?11 FDI figures exemplified a decade long trend of investment being overwhelmingly concentrated in the extractive (mining and oil and gas) and power sectors. Only 1 per cent of the FDI from FY2010?11 was outside these sectors, evidence that foreign investors saw few other viable investment opportunities in Myanmar?s challenging business climate. The majority of these investments came from neighbouring countries, most notably China, but also Thailand and South Korea. This is partly the result of Beijing?s often overstated but still sizable influence in Naypyidaw, as well as its desire to secure natural resources from abroad and bypass the strategic chokepoint that is the Straits of Malacca.4 But the source of Myanmar?s FDI is also shaped by other factors, including different home country investment patterns. China, for example, is historically a major investor in resource projects. Singapore and Japan tend to invest more in sectors such as real estate and manufacturing, yet because these projects were less viable in Myanmar for the last decade, investors from these countries have often turned elsewhere. Despite oft-cited competition for resource investment in Myanmar, India?s actual investment in the country has been miniscule, though Indian investors have in recent years spent approximately 80 per cent of their FDI on mergers and acquisitions, which are rare in Myanmar. The concentration of FDI has important implications for Myanmar?s economic development, as contrary to common perceptions FDI is not inherently or uniformly beneficial for a host country. Instead, the positives vary depending on the source and sector of investments, the forward and backward linkages they create with other parts of the economy, the number and types of jobs created, and the host country?s economic policies. Most of the FDI that has come into Myanmar in the last decade has created little direct employment and few linkages with existing industries, limiting their positive benefits. Despite this, FDI is still rightly viewed as an important part of Myanmar?s economic development. This paper reviews changes in the source country and economic sector of FDI in Myanmar using actual and approved investment data from 1989 until 2011. The data has been disaggregated by country, sector, and for select years both. It looks at FDI in two periods: the first from the passage of the Foreign Investment Law in November 1988 to the end of FY1999?2000, and the second from FY2000?01 to the present. This division was selected because it falls at the end of a decade, during a lull in both approved and actual investment (after most of the projects approved before the 1997?98 Asian Financial Crisis had been fulfilled), and around the time when the changing trends in Myanmar?s FDI were first becoming evident. The paper starts by noting some caveats of FDI figures in Myanmar. It then reviews recent literature on FDI in Myanmar, before examining the major trends in the country?s investment data. The next section compares these trends with those of Myanmar?s neighbours, Vietnam and Laos. The paper then engages with the theoretical literature on FDI to explore what these investment patterns reveal about the macro economy, and how they are shaped by geopolitics, sanctions, commercial concerns and the specific investment patterns of each home country. The paper closes with a brief examination of whether these FDI projects can contribute to broad-based economic development in Myanmar..."
Creator/author: Jared Bissinger
Source/publisher: Macquarie University
2012-08-03
Date of entry/update: 2016-04-23
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 603.46 KB
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Description: "... In debates about economic globalisation, the case for leading corporations to engage with some of the world?s most desperate development challenges is increasingly heard. In just the last few years, the World Bank and Mandle have shown that economic globalisation can operate to the benefit of the poor, Bhagwati and Wolf have issued powerful defences of globalisation, and Friedman has urged individuals, corporations and governments to seize the opportunities present in the increasingly "flat" world in which we live.2 From the peak of the international political system, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has endorsed all these arguments by holding that it is "the absence of broad-based business activity, not its presence, that condemns much of humanity to suffering."3 To stimulate action, he sponsored the UN Global Compact, dedicated to promoting responsible corporate citizenship throughout the world, and appointed its principal author, Kennedy School Professor John Ruggie, to the position of Special Representative on the issue of human rights and transnational corporations and other business enterprises. However, despite all the mood music lauding the contribution business can make to development, it remains an open question whether corporate engagement, and in particular inward investment, should take place in extreme contexts. On the one hand, foreign capitalist involvement in some industries, notably resource extraction, has long been seen as highly exploitative. For decades, neo-Marxist critiques of capitalist underdevelopment held sway, stressing the extent of local state dependence on foreign capitalist interests, and the catastrophic impact of corporate engagement on local economic, social and political evolution.4 Notions of captured, rentier states mired in corruption and committed to systematic exploitation of Third World populations were commonly encountered. Few other than baleful local effects, generated by unprincipled involvement on the part of foreign corporations, were recorded. Today, criticism of this kind continues to be heard in, for example, responses to the World Bank?s Extractive Industries Review, released in December 2003, which itself reached rather equivocal conclusions.5 Under the influence of more recent analyses of economic globalisation and its effects, should such activity now be encouraged? As economies are opened to the forces of global capitalism, is resource extraction to be placed alongside other corporate activity as positive and constructive in its contribution to pro-poor policies? On the other hand, all forms of corporate engagement with regimes that commit gross human rights violations are widely viewed as thoroughly unprincipled. For many years now, the sanctions lobby has trained a moral spotlight on inward investment in countries dominated by violator regimes. While the condemnation, and the resultant corporate pullouts, have always been highly selective, picking up on, say, Myanmar in the Asian context but making little comment on China, they have been no less powerful for that. Indeed, informal sanctions, targeting brands and corporations with a great deal to lose from negative publicity, have often been much more potent than formal government sanctions applied by the US and some of its allies.6 Again, under the influence of the latest writings on economic globalisation, should this activity also now be endorsed? Even in the most unpromising domains, can profits and principles be secured in tandem?7 This article tackles these issues by focusing on one very specific development context: Myanmar, or the country formerly known as Burma. By almost any definition, this is a difficult environment for poverty reduction.8 It is also one of the most unpromising settings for business activity, ranking last out of the 127 countries included in the Fraser Institute?s Economic Freedom of the World Index for 2003.9 Furthermore, the kinds of extreme circumstance that generate the greatest development challenges are readily found here. Global corporations are engaged in extractive activities that provoke fierce critiques. Reports published over many years by Amnesty International, EarthRights International, Human Rights Watch and other organisations document gross human rights abuse by government-backed forces in virtually all parts of a country of more than 50 million people. Within this context, the article examines one particularly controversial extractive enterprise: the Yadana gas project, in which Western oil companies have long been prime movers. The debate that encircles this project is of course not unique. It is nestled in a broader discourse about corporate engagement with rights violating regimes all over the world, and reflected in specific ethical controversies thathave flared up in recentyears.11 When companies such as Carlsberg, Heineken, Levi Strauss and Reebok pulled out of Myanmar in the early and mid-1990s, they made public the moral concerns that prompted their decisions.12 Equally, some corporations targeted by campaigners have issued ethical justifications for ongoing engagement.13 Similar divisions are visible in other spheres. While the Global Fund made a high-profile withdrawal from Myanmar in August 2005, citing intolerable official interference in its work to combat AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria, key internal groups such as the National League for Democracy and the Student Generations Since 1988 now call for humanitarian intervention; and international agencies such as Save the Children USA continue to operate inside the country.14 The Yadana project is special because this single case encapsulates Western corporate involvement in resource extraction in a highly repressive context. It also has the virtue of being very well documented. The article addresses two main questions. First, is the involvement of foreignowned corporations in Myanmar?s Yadana project to be welcomed? Second, with the experience gained from this involvement, can wider lessons about global corporate citizenship be drawn? To generate answers, the first section of the article provides some brief background material on the Yadana project. The second section then examines the cases made by its backers and critics, and evaluates the project from the perspective of its impact on the people of Myanmar. The third section focuses on wider lessons for corporate engagement that flow from the project, and in particular, the conditions in which inward investment in repressive settings is likely to be most constructive and positive in its effects. Applying these conditions to Myanmar, the fourth section considers ways forward for corporate involvement with the country. The article closes with a brief conclusion. The argument is that it is not possible to reach an overall evaluation of the Yadana project. However, some principles of responsible cross-border corporate engagement can be derived from it..."
Creator/author: Ian Holliday
Source/publisher: City University of Hong Kong
2008-01-02
Date of entry/update: 2016-04-22
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 1.62 MB
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Description: A coalition of Shan community based organizations has said a moratorium on resource extraction is urgently needed until there is nationwide peace and a discussion on the control and management of the country?s natural resources, much of which are in ethnic areas. The Shan CBOs referred to an anti-mining protest held on 5th September by 3,000 villagers in the town of Namkham, which lies near the border of China in northern Shan State, as one example of how ethnic communities felt they were being negatively affected by the resource extraction industry...Muay Noom Hom, a spokesperson for the Shan CBOs, said that the government?s decision to engage in resource extraction before a peace settlement with ethnic armed groups was irresponsible. ?Naypyidaw is selling off all our valuable resources even before getting to the negotiating table. By the time a settlement is reached, there will be nothing left,” she said..."
Source/publisher: KIC via BNI
2014-09-12
Date of entry/update: 2014-12-21
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: First International Conference on Regional Geology, Stratigraphy and Tectonics of Myanmar and neighbouring countries and Economic Geology (petroleum and mineral resources) of Myanmar
Source/publisher: The Myanmar Geosciences Society (MGS)
2012-03-00
Date of entry/update: 2012-10-07
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 1.12 MB
Local URL:
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Description: "U Soe Thane, Minister of Industry...during the Myanmar Forum in Singapore...announced that ?in time, we plan to introduce and practice Extractive Industries Transparency Initiatives (EITI)?. As part of its broader reform efforts, the government of Myanmar is now exploring the benefits of EITI implementation. ?We are preparing to be a signatory to the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative to ensure that there is maximum transparency in these sectors and try to make sure the benefits go to the vast majority of the people and not to a small group?, said President Thein Sein..."
Source/publisher: Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI)
2012-07-13
Date of entry/update: 2012-09-20
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: U.S. mining and exploration companies can now officially join their Australian, Canadian, Chinese, European, French, Thai and Korean counterparts in the rush to develop Burma?s mineral riches. RENO (MINEWEB) -
Creator/author: Dorothy Kosich
Source/publisher: Mineweb
2012-05-18
Date of entry/update: 2012-05-25
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "...Clinton said Washington would issue a general license to permit U.S. investments across Myanmar?s economy, and U.S. energy, mining and financial service companies were all now free to look for opportunities in the nation formerly known as Burma..."
Creator/author: Andrew Quinn, Paul Eckert
Source/publisher: Reuters
2012-05-17
Date of entry/update: 2012-05-25
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "It is reported in the Japanese press today that Itochu Corp has begun a feasibility study in the country to isolate specialty metals including tungsten and molybdenum. This follows approaches by Japanese officials last year trying to get a deal with Burma for access to rare earths, the elements vital to Japanese industry?s high tech and hybrid car programs. South Korea has also been lobbying the Burmese over rare earths. Chinese companies have also been eyeing projects in the country. In 2008, China National Petroleum Corp signed a 30-year gas agreement covering production from three blocks in the Bay of Bengal. But this is only the beginning. The country will be a big target because it has bountiful resources in close proximity to resource-hungry India and China..."
Creator/author: Robin Bromby
Source/publisher: "The Australian"
2012-05-04
Date of entry/update: 2012-05-06
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: (Mizzima) ? Burma has banned mining of mineral resources along the country?s four major river courses or near the river banks in a bid to preserve the natural environment, according to an order of the Ministry of Mines made public Thursday.
Source/publisher: Mizzima
2012-03-30
Date of entry/update: 2012-03-31
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: A report on mining in Burma. The problems mining is bringing to the Burmese people, and the multinational companies involved in it. Includes an analysis of the SLORC 1994 Mining Law.... ?Grave Diggers, authored by world renowned mining environmental activist Roger Moody, was the first major review of mining in Burma since the country?s military regime opened the door to foreign mining investment in 1994. Singled out for special attention in this report is the stake taken up by Canadian mining promoter Robert Friedland, whose Ivanhoe Mines has redeveloped a major copper mine in the Monywa area in joint venture enterprise with Burma?s military regime. There are several useful appendices with first hand reports from mining sites throughout the country. A series of maps shows the location of the exploration concessions taken up almost exclusively by foreign companies in the rounds of bidding that took place in the nineties.
Creator/author: Roger Moody
Source/publisher: Various groups
2000-02-14
Date of entry/update: 2010-09-09
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 1.18 MB
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Description: Executive Summary: "This report describes how human rights and environmental abuses continue to be a serious problem in eastern Pegu division, Burma ? specifi cally, in Shwegyin township of Nyaunglebin District. The heavy militarization of the region, the indiscriminate granting of mining and logging concessions, and the construction of the Kyauk Naga Dam have led to forced labor, land confi scation, extortion, forced relocation, and the destruction of the natural environment. The human consequences of these practices, many of which violate customary and conventional international law, have been social unrest, increased fi nancial hardship, and great personal suffering for the victims of human rights abuses. By contrast, the SPDC and its business partners have benefi ted greatly from this exploitation. The businessmen, through their contacts, have been able to rapidly expand their operations to exploit the township?s gold and timber resources. The SPDC, for its part, is getting rich off the fees and labor exacted from the villagers. Its dam project will forever change the geography of the area, at great personal cost to the villagers, but it will give the regime more electricity and water to irrigate its agro-business projects. Karen villagers in the area previously panned for gold and sold it to supplement their incomes from their fi elds and plantations. They have also long been involved in small-scale logging of the forests. In 1997, the SPDC and businessmen began to industrialize the exploitation of gold deposits and forests in the area. Businessmen from central Burma eventually arrived and in collusion with the Burmese Army gained mining concessions and began to force people off of their land. Villagers in the area continue to lose their land, and with it their ability to provide for themselves. The Army abuses local villagers, confi scates their land, and continues to extort their money. Commodity prices continue to rise, compounding the diffi culties of daily survival. Large numbers of migrant workers have moved into the area to work the mining concessions and log the forests. This has created a complicated tension between the Karen and these migrants. While the migrant workers are merely trying to earn enough money to feed their families, they are doing so on the Karen?s ancestral land and through the exploitation of local resources. Most of the migrant workers are Burman, which increases ethnic tensions in an area where Burmans often represent the SPDC and the Army and are already seen as sneaky and oppressive by the local Karen. These forms of exploitation increased since the announcement of the construction of the Kyauk Naga Dam in 2000, which is expected to be completed in late 2006. The SPDC has enabled the mining and logging companies to extract as much as they can before the area upstream of the dam is fl ooded. This situation has intensifi ed and increased human rights violations against villagers in the area. The militarization of the region, as elsewhere, has resulted in forced labor, extortion of money, goods, and building materials, and forced relocation by the Army. In addition to these direct human rights violations, the mining and dam construction have also resulted in grave environmental degradation of the area. The mining process has resulted in toxic runoff that has damaged or destroyed fi elds and plantations downstream. The dam, once completed, will submerge fi elds, plantations, villages, and forests. In addition, the dam will be used to irrigate rubber plantations jointly owned by the SPDC and private business interests. The Burmese Army has also made moves to secure the area in the mountains to the east of the Shwegyin River. This has led to relocations and the forced displacement of thousands of Karen villagers living in the mountains. Once the Army has secured the area, the mining and logging companies will surely follow..."
Source/publisher: EarthRights International (ERI)
2007-02-20
Date of entry/update: 2007-03-06
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "...Women?s groups and environmental groups have much to gain by collaborating with one another on mining in Burma. To this end, this article offers additional background information that will be of interest to groups concerned with either women?s rights or the environment. Each section summarizes areas where these respective issues overlap..." "...I found this report to be particularly useful for the information and insights it provides into artisanal mining in Burma, especially the more recent developments in the Hukanwng valley in Kachin State that Alan Rabinowitz came across in his travels in the area. There are some tantalizing references to the Northern Star Co in Myitkyina which apparently controls all mining operations in the state. Also very useful for the discussion of the various extractive methods used in artisanal mining and in particular the "cooking" process (referred to as "dohtar" in Burmese), used to extract small amounts of copper from mining residue and which the report describes as a a "less technologically sophisticated version of the copper solvent extraction and electrowinning pilot plant built by Ivanhoe in Monywa". This article is very well researched. There are also updates in the same Earthrights report to the proposed pipeline to India from the offshore gas field in near Sittway and to continuing use of forced labour in the Yadana pipeline corridor in northern Tenasserim ..." - Eric Snider... Extractive Industries in Burma: Mining in Comparative Context; Challenges to Studying Mining in Burma; International Women and Mining Conference; Case study: The Gendered Impacts of Gold Mining Operations in Kachin State, Burma; Key Health and Safety Issues for Burmese Women; Recommendations and Areas for Future Research.
Source/publisher: EarthRights International
2004-11-00
Date of entry/update: 2004-12-05
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "?Capitalizing on Conflict? presents information illustrating how trade in timber, gems, and gold is financing violent conflict, including widespread and gross human rights abuses, in Burma. Although trade in these ?conflict goods? accounts for a small percentage of the total global trade, it severely compromises human security and undermines socio-economic development, not only in Burma, but throughout the region. Ironically, cease-fire agreements signed between the late 1980s and early 1990s have dramatically expanded the area where businesses operate. While many observers have have drawn attention to the political ramifications of these ceasefires, little attention has been focused on the economic ramifications. These ceasefires, used strategically by the military regime to end fighting in some areas and foment intra-ethnic conflict in others and weaken the unity of opposition groups, have had a net effect of increasing violence in some areas. Capitalizing on Conflict focuses on two zones where logging and mining are both widespread and the damage from these activities is severe... Both case studies highlight the dilemmas cease-fire arrangements often pose for the local communities, which frequently find themselves caught between powerful and conflicting military and business interests. The information provides insights into the conditions that compel local communities to participate in the unsustainable exploitation of their own local resources, even though they know they are destroying the very ecosystems they depend upon to maintain their way of life. The other alternative — to stand aside and let outsiders do it and then be left with nothing — is equally unpalatable..." Table of Contents: Map of Burma; Map of Logging and Mining Areas; Executive Summary; Recommendations; Part I: Context; General Background on Cease-fires; Conflict Trade and Burma; Part II: Logging Case Study; Background on the Conflict; Shwe Gin Township (Pegu Division); Papun Districut (Karen State); Reported Socio-Economic and Environmental Impacts; Part III: Mining Case Study; Background on the Conflict; Mogok (Mandalay Division); Shwe Gin Township (Pegu Division); Reported Socio-Economic and Environmental Impacts; Conclusion.
Creator/author: Ken MacLean
Source/publisher: EarthRights International (ERI), Karen Environnmental & Social Action Network (KESAN)
2003-10-00
Date of entry/update: 2003-11-07
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 939.97 KB
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