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Philippines: Gov’t mining areas to be converted into ecozones
MANILA, Philippines — Unutilized mining areas owned by the government will soon be transformed into economic zones to boost the domestic processing of minerals, the head of the Philippine Economic Zone Authority (PEZA) said.
PEZA director general Charito Plaza said her agency is set to forge a deal with the Philippine Mining Development Corp. (PMDC), a government-owned and controlled corporation attached to the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, to convert and declare its mining sites into mineral processing industry zones.
PMDC is tasked to promote, develop and administer the mining properties held directly by the government.
Plaza said PMDC has more than 8,000 hectares of mining lands, most of which are located in Diwalwal, Compostella Valley.
“So we will help the PMDC put order in this mining areas that are owned by the government. And we will invite soon the different mining companies of the country, encouraging them to put up mineral processing industries. This is also in line with the pronouncement of President
Duterte during his SONA that our government is now looking at how to stop the exportation of raw minerals. This project of PEZA, inviting mineral processing industries, is the answer,” Plaza said.
“It can add more industries, can create more jobs, and we will put a stop in the exportation of raw minerals, and at the same time protect the environment because what is happening now, most of our mining companies do not have mineral processing industries. So they sell their minerals raw, including the soil,” she added.
As in the case of the PMDC-owned mining areas in Diwalwal, Plaza said these sites are mostly occupied by squatters instead of investors.
“In Diwalwal, basically it’s a gold mining area. Once we bring a gold mine processing plant or a gold processing plant, which many already manifested to come, we will be able to put a stop on the illegal extraction of our minerals, the illegal trade or smuggling, especially of our gold. Because what reaches us in PEZA is, most of our gold is being smuggled to Hong Kong and other countries, and operated by squatters,” Plaza said.
“So PEZA is now inviting the basic industries to come because we have the raw minerals as their source of the finished product,” she added.
Aside from the PMDC, Plaza said agreements with other government agencies for the conversion of idle lands into economic zones are also in the works.
“This public lands for example owned by or under the management of the Department of Finance, under the Property Management Office, these are the lands that were foreclosed by our government banks, so the Department of Finance is offering these to PEZA, to partner with PEZA in making these as ecozones. This means additional locations for our industries to choose from,” Plaza said.
“Then we also have a memorandum of agreement with PSALM under the Department of Energy, where all their land holdings will also be converted to become ecozones. And the nice thing about their properties, these are located beside or nearby sources of power,” she added.
Plaza said PEZA is set to launch by next month the Philippine Economic Zones Map.
The map will list all the existing and the new economic zones across country for investors to know where best to locate their industries.
Source: http://www.philstar.com/business/2017/10/16/1749105/govt-mining-areas-be-converted-ecozones