Richard Fifer

Children of the Molejon community, closest settlement to the Petaquilla Gold Project, bathe in the river with the same name, where the environmentalists claimed cyanide contamination

As any activity developed by humans, mining implies affectation and risks.

“Its an activity, that from its origins, has been preceded by a stigma that has become so powerful that most of us have forgotten that all we have, where we sit, our homes, comes from mining, whether it is metallic or not”, stated geologist and independent miner, Ana Mendez.

However, Mendez highlights that the present century has brought many significant changes to the mining industry; from new technologies, to corporate responsibility, and the safety on each project; but above all, the relationship with the communities has changed from a simple assistance point of view to a dialogue to fulfill their needs.

She stated that the anti-mining groups are more interested in capitalizing the risks and technical failures, than in the social and community works that are being done in each of the surrounding communities.

Such is the case of the Santa Rosa mine in Canazas, where there is a water treatment facility that produces great quality drinking water.  No one remembers the water treatment facility left by the mine, everyone just says than mine had a cyanide spill.

Mendez said that there is no strong evidence that international mining companies settle in countries with low environmental standards because those companies are obligated to use, in the countries they perform the exploitation as well as their origin countries, the highest environmental standards.

Mendez also mentioned the “Inti Raymi Gold Mine” in Bolivia, which could not be developed since there was no environmental law to protect it, and the government established an environmental reform in order to protect it because the company would not come in, unless there were high environmental standards in agreement to the ones they were use to work with in the rest of the world.

The geologist also mentioned the mining moratorium of Costa Rica, which has a full name and its called “Minera Miramar”, located at the Nicaraguan border.  “And what does that country have right now? A Geopolitical problem, there are 72 grants waiting to be signed in Costa Rica, where only open sky mining is forbidden because underground mining will continue to be developed” she explained.

Costa Rica can say they don’t want gold mining for the simple reason that they don’t have the same volume of mineral found in Panama.

Mendez also said that the anti-mining activists have told the people in Petaquilla that they will die of lung cancer “it cant be the case because there is no lead there, there isn’t in the Panamanian deposits”.

Petaquilla Gold S.A., led by entrepreneur Richard Fifer-Carles, uses in its mining project all the national and international standards in the topics of safety and environment, which contribute to the development of a process that counts with first class technology allowing them to apply all the safety and risk prevention measures for a project of this magnitude, periodically supervised by national authorities.

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3. RICHARD FIFER – Mining
4. Panamas Promising Future in the Mining Industry
5. Study performed by company Ambiente e Industrias reveals absence of contamination in rivers