State policies may discourage Mexico mining investment

Significance The government claims the mining firm and its Mexican subsidiary, Primero Empresa Minera, owe around MXN11bn (USD534mn) in taxes; First Majestic claims the government is violating the terms of its Advance Pricing Agreement and failing to follow procedures established in double taxation treaties. Impacts The economy minister has voiced support for mining, but is unlikely to contradict AMLO’s stance in such a high-profile case. The government accuses the firm of using the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement to avoid its tax obligations, but will not seek amendments. Some congress members have called for lithium industry nationalisation, but nationalisation of other areas of the sector remains unlikely.

Contracting Beyond the Market

Despite growing engagements between firms and nonmarket stakeholders—such as local communities and nongovernmental organizations —research has yet to examine the emergence of formal contracts between them. Given that a very large number of such contracts are theoretically possible but only a small number exist, we seek to understand what factors explain the use of contracts to govern some relationships between firms and nonmarket stakeholders but not others. We draw on transaction cost economics to study transactions wherein a nonmarket stakeholder provides a firm access to a valuable resource and to understand when these transactions are governed by formal contracts. We propose that, when a firm makes site-specific investments, a stakeholder’s use rights to the resource sought by the firm, the negative externalities generated by its use, and the stakeholder’s capacity for collective mobilization increase holdup risk for the firm and therefore the probability of a contract. We collect novel data on the location of indigenous communities and mines in Canada to identify a plausible exhaustive set of indigenous communities “at risk” of signing a contract with a mining firm. We test our hypotheses by relying, respectively, on historically assigned property rights over lands, the mine-community colocation in a watershed and proximity on transportation routes, and archival records of community mobilization events. We find support for our propositions by examining which of the 5,342 dyads formed by 459 indigenous communities and 98 firms signed 259 contracts between 1999 and 2013.

Review and Restructure of Zambia's 2008 Mining Windfall Tax

Zambia is richly endowed with mineral wealth. However, it is still encapsulated in the resource curse conundrum. This is because the benefits of mineral wealth have not translated into public development. This has sparked a lot of debate among the Zambian citizenry as to whether the mineral fiscal policies instituted over time have been robust in capturing mining revenue. One issue has always stood out in these mineral taxation debates and this is the reintroduction of the 2008 mining windfall tax. Though this is the case, the Zambian citizenry has not been informed of the various issues leading to its revocation. This paper tries to undertake a critical review and restructure of this tax instrument to rectify the inherent technical lapses in its design. This has been realized by treating the payable amount of this tax as a deductible expense in the income statement and by indexing the trigger prices for inflation. The results of this research indicate that the restructured tax instrument has the potential of maximizing the capture of windfall gains without imposing a higher than normal average effective tax rate and marginal effective tax rate on a mining firm’s pre-tax cash flows. This in turn retains capital to the mining firm for further exploration and other mine developmental activities. However, this tax needs to be balanced with other tax instruments for greater efficiency and effectiveness in its application. Advancing this cause calls for a sound judgement on the part of policy formulators.

Capital Comes North: Exploring the Discursive Challenges to International Solidarity among Nickel Miners in Sudbury, Ontario

This article draws on twenty-six qualitative interviews with rank-and-file United Steelworkersnickel miners in Sudbury, Ontario. It analyses some of the challenges to building internationalsolidarity at Brazilian-based multinational mining firm Vale. Engaging with labour geography andlabour movement renewal scholarship, the article explores how identity formation andinstitutional structures interact to shape workers’ understandings of their interests and capacities.In particular, it considers the impact of national identity as it arose in response to the issue offoreign ownership during the interviews. The findings suggest that attempts by the union todiscursively reframe workers’ struggle against their new multinational employer have yet to fullycontend with the persistence of spatially bound forms of working-class identity and interestsamong workers in the sample.KEYWORDS: international solidarity; discursive framing; spatial interests; national identity; nickel mining

Economic Law Creation Beautiful Global Indonesia

<p><em>Indonesia is the world 's largest archipelago with 1,904,569 km2 of surface area. A very diverse landscape with a variety of abundance of flora and fauna is a special attraction for foreign tourists. Not only that, the natural wealth in Indonesia 's intestines is also very abundant, as are various minerals and richness from other mining materials. However, a abundance of skilled human capital, both in terms of science and technology mastered, do not complement the plentiful natural resources. This is one of the reasons superpowers should be providing cooperation. PT. PT. Freeport is an clear example of Indonesia 's collaboration in the mining sector with foreign parties. The first contract for Freeport-Indonesia was established in 1967. After the Foreign Investment Law was passed in 1967, Freeport became the first foreign mining firm to operate in Indonesia. But the existence of this partnership was regretted by many because it was perceived to be detrimental to the region. The reason is that so far nobody knows for sure how much gold and silver has been produced from the mining to date. The magnitude of the distribution of mining goods is also not quite good given that Indonesia owns land which is turned into gold fields. There are, in fact, many reports uncovering miserable stories of discrimination by indigenous people around the mining region. Justice is once again present as something that is not only wishful thinking, but also noble values that have to be realized for the collective good of the state goals set out in the Pancasila points and the preamble to the Constitution of 1945.</em></p><p><em> </em></p><p><strong>Keywords</strong>: <em>Mining, PT. Freeport, Discrimination, justice</em><em></em></p>

Illusory Neutrality, 1914–1918

This chapter looks at the contradictory set of international legal and political requirements prevailing on Spain and Morocco during World War I. There was little will on the part of Spain to enter the conflict, yet it was unclear how to adhere to the requirements of wartime neutrality while also meeting the obligation to administer a portion of the Moroccan Sultanate, a belligerent state by virtue of association with France. German agents, such as the Mannesmann mining firm, exploited this legal and political grey zone to infiltrate the pro-Entente sultanate via the many maritime smuggling networks, brigands, and safe havens of Spanish Morocco. Although this had little bearing on the war’s outcome, it convinced the leader of the French colonial army, Hubert Lyautey, that the Spanish officer corps was an unreliable partner.

Energy storage advances could increase vanadium prices

Subject The market for vanadium is expanding. Significance The price of ferrovanadium (FeV), one of the two key products containing vanadium, has risen by nearly 300% since the start of 2017 to close to 80 dollars per kilogram (kg). China’s increasingly stringent environmental regulations have contributed, notably this year’s ban on importing many types of waste (previously a main source of vanadium slag). Electricity storage demand has also contributed -- batteries used 3,000 tonnes of vanadium in 2017, twice as much as the year before. Impacts The US commerce department could restrict uranium imports; this could incentivise domestic mining, producing more vanadium as a byproduct. Use of titanium-aluminium-vanadium alloys is rising in aircraft manufacturing; the new Boeing and Airbus models each use up to 100 tonnes. Rising vanadium prices could incentivise steel producers to increase substitution with cheaper ferroniobium. Economic sanctions that affect Russian steelmaking and mining firm Evraz could reduce global availability of ferrovanadium.

Three Diverse Examples of Multistakeholder Partnerships

This chapter presents three very different partnership cases. The first focuses on partnerships among Rabobank, the second largest Dutch bank known for investments in food and agriculture worldwide, and two NGOs who worked with it to develop a climate-neutral credit card and to improve its investment portfolio’s carbon footprint. The second case addresses the collaborative design of a relicensing process for hydroelectric plants regulated by the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). To improve the efficiency and equity of the relicensing process, FERC engaged in a collaborative governance process with stakeholders that produced new, widely legitimate relicensing procedures. The third reviews the IMF’s extended effort to build a partnership to address conflict over water contamination by a Peruvian gold mine. With many diverse local stakeholders and a resistant mining firm, this partnership struggled to achieve its goals. The case emphasizes the role of conveners, raising questions about partnering across power differences.

DAMPAK KARAKTERISTIK DEWAN DIREKSI TERHADAP PENGUNGKAPAN CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY PADA PERUSAHAAN PERTAMBANGAN DI INDONESIA

This research aims at examining the effect of board of directorscharacteristics on corporate social responsibility disclosure using Indonesia miningindustry context. Indonesia use two tier board system: board of directors and board ofcommissioners. Board of directors engage in management work and board ofcommissioners supervise board of directors. This study focus on board of directorscharacteristics: gender, tenure, board size and percentage of foreign directors. Sampleof the study consists of listed firm in mining sectors at Indonesia Stock Exchange(IDX). There are 106 observations from 2013 – 2015 period. This study use GRI indexto measure corporate social responsibility disclosure. The result of the study shows thatforeign directors have negative effect on the corporate social responsibility. This resultshows that foreign directors might not have positive effect on how mining firm disclosecorporate social responsibility disclosure. Further, gender and board of directors sizehave positive effect on corporate social responsibility. Woman as chief executiveofficer provide better disclosure on corporate social responsibility. However, tenurehave no significant effect on corporate social disclosure using Indonesian context.