Responsible mining

Last December, the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) lifted the four-year ban on the open-pit method of mining for copper, gold, silver and complex ores in the country.

According to the DENR, open-pit mining is a globally accepted method of mining and the most feasible option for mining near-surface or shallow ore deposits.

Department officials explained that the lifting of the ban is meant to revitalize the mining industry and usher in significant economic benefits to the country by providing raw materials for the construction and development of other industries and by increasing employment opportunities in rural areas.

The total ban was ordered by former DENR Secretary Gina Lopez in 2017, citing the destructive nature and potential for disaster of open-pit mining, aside from the fact that the method is a financial liability, poses risks to host communities, and kills the economic potential of the community.

According to Lopez, most mining disasters in the country were due to the tailings spills associated with open-pit mining

Department Order 2017-10 noted that open-pit mines cause adverse impacts to the environment, particularly due to the generation of acidic and/or heavy metal-laden water, erosion of mine waste dumps and/or vulnerability of tailings dams to geological hazards.

It was meant to prevent a repeat of major mine tailings spills that contaminated waterways in Marinduque in 1996 and in Benguet in 2012.

The Marcopper mining disaster in 1996 has been described as one of the worst mining and environmental disasters in Philippine history.

House Speaker Lord Allan Jay Velasco said the government should continue to demand accountability from Marcopper for its irresponsible mining practices that have caused irreparable damage to the environment and to the people of Marinduque.

But Marcopper’s negligence as well as the unsustainable and dangerous practices of a few irresponsible miners should not penalize the whole industry and millions of people who depend on it.

Environment Secretary Roy Cimatu, in overturning the 2017 ban on open-pit mining last Dec. 23, believes that there are methods and technologies that could held avoid or mitigate the negative impacts of open-pit mining.

Cimatu’s directive came eight months after President Duterte lifted a moratorium on new mining agreements which was imposed in 2012 by then President Benigno Aquino III as part of efforts to reform the mining sector.

One of the first major mining project to benefit from the lifting of the open-pit mining ban would be Saggitarius Mines’ Tampakan Copper-Gold project in South Cotabato.

This was after the Sangguniang Panlalawigan of South Cotabato amended the province’s Environmental Code which effectively lifted a ban on open-pit mining and which paved the way for the resumption of the $5.9-billion mining project.

The Chamber of Mines of the Philippines (COMP) believes that open-pit mines can be operated safely according to globally accepted standards and can be rehabilitated properly in a manner that provides alternative and productive land use after the life of the mine.

According to COMP, headed by its chairman Michael Toledo, better opportunities lie ahead in South Cotabato and other areas from big-ticket mining projects.

He said that together with Silangan and Kingking ($2-billion project of St. Augustine Gold and Copper Ltd in Compostela Valley) which are two other copper-gold projects in Mindanao, Tampakan would be a powerful vehicle to achieve a vibrant, multi-faceted local and regional economy that provides sustainable employment, business opportunities, and other social development programs that will improve and enhance the quality of life of those living in these projects’ host and neighboring communities.

Toledo noted that when these projects go full swing, they can increase yearly national government revenues by P12 billion a year, local government revenues by P1.5 billion, exports by almost $2 billion, and social expenditures by P800 million per year, but added that COMP welcomes any regulatory changes that would allow the revitalization of mining in the country.

The Philippines’s mining potential is still largely untapped. According to the Mines and Geosciences Bureau, more than a third of the country’s total land area of 30 million hectares has been identified as having high mineral potential, but only less than five percent of its mineral reserves has been extracted so far.

To ensure the safe conduct of open-pit mining, the DENR in its new order lifting the ban requires project proponents to ensure that their method would not pose any hazard to public health and safety that might result from ground failure or physical deterioration and that it would not release any hazardous chemicals into the environment but adopting proven and acceptable techniques to control it through internationally accepted containment, collection and treatment methods.

As in any new law or set of rules or regulations, implementation is the key. Mining companies should never be allowed to just extract nature’s resources and then leave the land permanently scarred without any thought of the consequences that their activities have caused on the surroundings and the people around it.

When I visited the Mt. Isa Mines in Australia before, the mining company many years before the life of the mine ends is already in consultation with the community as to what to do with the huge hole created on the ground by the open-pit mining process.

Transparency and accountability are of course key to making sure that the mining disasters of the past will never happen again. Both the government and the leaders of our mining industry should work hand in hand to create a regulatory environment that will help achieve more sustainable mining practices by learning from the best practices adopted by other countries.

For comments, e-mail at [email protected].