Land Reclamation forum held for miners

 

[www.inewsguyana.com] – The Ministry of Natural Resources & Environment today (July, 16) held its Land Reclamation project miners’ forum to educate and enlighten miners on how they can incorporate land reclamation with mining and the benefits that can be derived from this process.

Land Reclamation is the restoration of the land distributed by mining operations to an environmentally sound and productive condition for present and future generations.

During the presentation, factors that would contribute to successful reclamation were also highlighted which includes getting miners to understand the concepts of the process and the economic benefits that can be derived, along with the enforcement of the environmental regulations and non-disturbance of sites under and after reclamation.

The importance of land reclamation was also stressed by Director of the Land Reclamation project, Godfrey Scott who explained that when mined areas are properly undertaken, it is safe for the regeneration of plant and animal life or for human use and habitation.

Additionally, Scott said investment by miners into land reclamation is between $600,000 to $1.5 million and said miners have nothing to lose.

Meanwhile, Minister of Natural Resources & Environment, Robert Persaud noted that this type of process will also fall in line with Government’s Low Carbon Development Strategy

The Minister emphasized that this process will in no way curtail mining operations here.

“There are some who are pressuring us within the society and even externally that we should curtail and in fact we should look at ways in slowing down and reducing mining and we held the view that mining is critical to the national development of our country.”

Further, the Minister noted that the resources which are being mined are necessary to be exploited for the development of the country. However, the interest lies in conducting sensible, sustainable and responsible mining so that the full benefits would be derived and the environment would not be harmed.

Minister Persaud also spoke about bonds posted to ensure mine sites are reclaimed even if the company goes out of business or fails to clean up the land for some other reason. The bond is not released until the mining site has been fully reclaimed and GGMC finds that the reclamation was successful. [Tracey Khan – Drakes]