Balochistan will earn $13 billion, CEO TTC tells Supreme Court

The Supreme Court was told on Tuesday that Reko Diq copper gold mines project would help strengthen the livelihoods of poverty-stricken province of Balochistan as 13 billion dollars (52 percent share) out of total 25 billion dollars, operating profit would be given to Balochistan government.
This was stated by chief executive officer Tethyan Copper Company (TCC) and senior vice president capital projects for Antofagasta PLC (a Chilean company) Gerhard Von Borries while giving a briefing to a four-member bench of Supreme Court, comprising Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, Justice Muhammad Sair Ali, Justice Ghulam Rabbani and Justice Khalil-ur-Rehman Ramday over award of Reko-Diq project in Balochistan.
CEO TCC apprised the apex court that at present, a team of 30 geologists along with 200 trained workers have been working at the site and once the project headed on, they would employ 11,500 locals to be trained in the relevant field. He said they are working on an area of 535 square feet which is made 0.2 percent of the whole Chaghi district.
To a bench's query, he replied that deposits in the area contained 80 percent copper and 20 percent gold, while 50 percent investment cost would be spent inside the country and manufacturing work would also be carried out in Pakistan.
He said the mining and exploration was a difficult process, which requires state-of-the-art technology and highly trained professionals. To a question raised by chief justice, he said smelting process (a process in extractive metallurgy used to produce a metal from its ore) could be done in Pakistan but the TCC is not a smelting company. He said that for exploration of copper reserves in the specified area, the company had invested 220 million dollars while initial capital cost stood around 3.299 billion dollars. With expansion of Reko-Diq project, he added, Pakistani companies doing manufacturing business would be invited to get maximum benefits.
The CEO further said that other companies who were given contracts had fled from the area but they were staying there with focused task. He said their predecessor BHP, a major company, had left the area but they were task focused. The CEO said that they had shared feasibility report with the provincial government. Replying to a question raised by Justice Sair Ali, about reapplying for the license after the company abandoned the area, he said that they found the area ideal as they were here with full fledged mining business.
Giving further information, he said, there were about 2.2 billion tons of copper reserves in the area with $2.20/pd for copper and $9.25 oz for gold. The government of Balochistan, he added, has asked us not to share details of contract with the federation but we will be pleased to share it with the federal government in an in-camera briefing because it falls under intellectual property rights.
He said the company would be happy, it was scrutinised by an international independent party. He said that the company is arranging loans from the banks under guarantees and did not need to underestimate or overestimate the figures. Terming Reko-Diq area as the finest mining place, he said, if copper prices went down they would be able to operate without going into the losses. To a query of the bench, he said the smelting process was carried out in China, Korea, Japan and US, but they would take the raw material to China due to its location from the Gwadar port.
"If Reko Diq project is expanded these Chinese and Japanese smelting companies will come here seeking permission for setting up their machinery," he added. He said they would also provide other basic facilities in the area and would run their own transport for the workers. He said the TCC had been working on billions dollars projects world-wide including in Chile, which had 46 percent copper reserves in the world. Raza Kazim, counsel for Maulana Abdul Haq, a petitioner, said that Afghanistan government had most recently signed a contract over Zakhan gold project, which was far better then Reko-Diq gold mining project. He will resume his arguments on today (Wednesday).