Talks between Australian investors and the Papua New Guinean and Bougainville governments over plans to reopen the Panguna copper mine in the Autonomous Region of Bougainville have slowed. Geol. Speaking at the company’s 2020 annual general meeting (AGM) last week BCL chairman Sir Melchior Togolo, said the new w Following the discovery of vast copper ore deposits in Crown Prince Range, Bougainville Copper Limited (Bougainville Copper or the company) operated a large open pit mine and processing facility at Panguna in central Bougainville in the North Solomon’s Province of … The Panguna mine, located in the east of Papua New Guinea in the Autonomous Region of Bougainville, was at the centre of Bougainville’s decade-long civil war. Between 1980 and 1987 the PLA helped landowners to increase their share of the benefits being generated by the mine (see Okole 1990). If the giant Panguna copper mine on Bougainville is ever to re-open, many complex problems must be solved, including the status of the former miner, Bougainville Copper Limited (BCL). Bougainville Copper Limited (BCL) – operators of the former Panguna Mine, have once again reaffirmed their commitment to the mine. BCL is committed to undertaking appropriate remediation and rehabilitation studies and implementing environmental programs regardless of the future operation of the Panguna mine. The Panguna mine was not the only project of Rio's in PNG that ran into difficulties. The Panguna mine was the largest single source of the country's export revenues and comprised about 7 per cent of global copper production. Bougainville Copper Ltd D Case Study Help, Case Study Solution & Analysis & Pacnews provides access to firsthand experiences, created by journalists to the location—Pacific journalists writing about their own location and gathering Bougainville’s struggle sprouted from colonial exploits at the now-defunct Panguna mine. The Panguna mine was a large open pit copper mine operated by Bougainville Copper Limited from 1972 to 1989. 1. Even more importantly, BCL remains at present the only source of any hard data that might enable us to consider the mine’s commercial viability. Twenty-five years on, Bougainville is readying for a deferred referendum on independence — one of the central pillars of the Bougainville Peace Agreement — to be held sometime between 2015 and 2020. 28.08.2012 ♦ PAUL COLEMAN. Rio Tinto subsidiary Bougainville Copper (BCL) ran the Panguna copper and gold mine in Papua New Guinea from the early 1970s to 1990 when it was abandoned during a civil war that was largely fought over how mine profits should be shared. BCL remains at present the only Civil war forced Rio Tinto unit Bougainville Copper to halt production in 1989 at what was then one of the largest copper mines in the world. From 1972 until 1989 Bougainville Copper Limited operated a large open pit mine and processing facility at Panguna on Bougainville Island in the North Solomons Province of Papua New Guinea producing copper concentrate containing significant quantities of gold and silver. For 17 years until 1989, the Panguna mine was one of the world’s largest and richest copper and gold mines, run by Rio Tinto subsidiary Bougainville Copper Limited. Bougainville had a history of small-scale mining, but the identification of a major gold, copper and silver orebody at Panguna in the 1960s led to the operation of a major mine. The abrupt shut-down of the Panguna mine in 1989 and its closure during the subsequent period of conflict on Bougainville meant there was no opportunity to implement plans for its formal closure. Home to Panguna mine, established in 1972 and once the largest open-cut copper mine in the world, Bougainville was a striving province which generated a large Rio handed its shareholding in the mine to national and local governments in 2016. After all consultations with all stakeholders we will proceed with pre-feasibility studies on reopening the Panguna Mine. Bougainvillean leaders alleged that the mine had devastating environmental consequences for the island. Bougainville Copper Limited Annual Report 2009, 32-33. The company which used to the run the controversial Panguna copper mine on the island of Bougainville is now trying to reopen it with the support of the island's Government. In 1989, the massive Panguna copper mine, which was at the centre of a decade-long conflict in Bougainville, was forced to close. The mine at Panguna was opened in 1972 and majority-owned by Rio Tinto.It was important to the economy of Papua New Guinea, but the people of Bougainville were seeing little benefit from it.The first Bougainville independence movement arose in the late 1960s, as people aired their grievances against the Australian colonial government over the handling of the Panguna mine. It's been estimated as many as 15,000 people died. case that reopening Panguna is commercially viable and that it is the company with the experience to do it. Bougainville is divided into three regions: North, Central and South. Bougainville's Panguna copper mine was the major revenue earner for the PNG state in its early decades of independence. Company Secretary of Bougainville Copper Limited . As the Bougainville, an autonomous region of Papua New Guinea (PNG), has been inhabited by humans for at least 29,000 years, according to artefacts found in Kilu Cave on Buka Island.The region is named after Bougainville Island, the largest island of the Solomon Islands archipelago, but also contains a number of smaller islands.. Bougainville Copper Ltd (BCL) carried out a new redevelopment study last year to identify a viable, phased re-start and expansion strategy for the Panguna mine in the Autonomous Region of Bougainville. A 10-year civil conflict shaped the history and identity of Bougainville. The Panguna mine and BCL were at the heart of the divisions in the Papua New Guinea region that led to the ten year civil war and prompted a shut down of the mine and a pull out by the then Rio Tinto controlled company. Between 1972 and 1989, the gaping hole in the Guava Mountains in central Bougainville provided nearly half of Papua New Guinea’s GDP and made its operator, Bougainville Copper Limited (BCL) – a former subsidiary of Rio Tinto – billions of dollars. In this exclusive interview with Business Advantage PNG, BCL Chairman Rob … They also claimed that Bougainville Copper had set up a system of apartheid on the island, with one set of facilities for white workers, and one set for the locals. The Panguna copper mine in Bougainville, Papua New Guinea, was discovered in the 1960s by one of our founding companies, with first production commencing in 1972. In order to press home this customary power, clan groups in the Bougainville mine area organised themselves through the Panguna Landowners Association (PLA). Bougainville Copper also trained some 12,000 employees, including approximately 1,000 completing full trade apprenticeships and some 400 completing graduate and post-graduate studies that resulted in considerable progress in the localisation of the company’s employees and significantly added to the number of skilled workers elsewhere in the country’s workforce. The mine is located to the east of Papua New Guinea in the Autonomous Region of Bougainville. BCL, a former Rio Tinto subsidiary and a publicly listed company on the Australian Securities Exchange, managed operations at the mine. Bougainville Copper, which is no longer associated with Rio, has estimated it would take seven to eight years and $5 billion to $6 billion to rebuild the mine and resume full operations. 11. Bougainville Copper Ltd is laying out its plans for a possible return to the Panguna mine in central Bougainville. Bougainville Copper Limited is one of the Australian mining companies part of the Rio Tinto Group. Eastoe, C.J., 1978, A fluid inclusions study at the Panguna porphyry copper deposit, Bougainville, Papua New Guinea: Economic Geology, v. 73, p. 721 748. The Bougainville Copper Limited (BCL) carried out a new redevelopment study during 2019 to identify a viable, re-start and expansion strategy for the Panguna mine. gold, copper and silver ore body in Panguna in the 1960s prompted Rio subsidiary Bougainville Copper (BCL) to operate a large mine from 1972 to 1989.But that stopped when the Bougainville civil war began, and the Panguna mine was a focal point.It lasted for nearly a decade. Bougainville Copper is 53 per cent owned by Rio Tinto, with the PNG government holding a further 19 per cent. The progress on reopening the mine has moved forward, it is steady and it is heading in the right direction." On … Royalties from the CRA copper mine at Panguna accounted for 40% of PNGs exports and 17-20% of government revenue. 2013). Photograph: Bougainville Copper Ltd Introduction ... (CRA) copper mine that began operations in 1972 in Panguna at the centre of the main island. v73 pp703-720 Macnamara P M, 1968 - Rock types and mineralization at Panguna: in Stephenson H H, 1973 Bougainville, The Establishment of a Copper Mine Construction, Mining, Engineering Publications, Melbourne, Australia pp 36-43 Bougainville Copper Ltd has started an initial study into re- opening the Panguna mine which has been closed since the 1989.The largest shareholder in BCL, Rio Tinto Group will finish the study in August.However they have not been allowed on the abandoned site thus the study cannot provide a workable estimate of the cost of… Ford J H, 1978 - A chemical study of alteration at the Panguna porphyry copper deposit, Bougainville, Papua New Guinea: in Econ. But it's been mothballed since the Bougainville crisis broke out three decades ago over a range of social and environmental grievances related to the mine. Case Study: Bougainville – Papua New Guinea. 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