- Write by:
-
Friday, June 8, 2018 - 8:12:40 PM
-
1036 Visit
-
Print
Mining News - Escondida Workers Strike with Police in March 2017
Copper`s stunning rally this week continued in New York on Thursday with the metal touching a high of $3.32 a pound ($7,310 a tonne), the highest since January 2014, before paring some of those gains as worries about labour-related supply disruptions in key producing regions resurface.
Workers at the Escondida copper mine in Chile, the world`s top producing mine by a country mile, fired an opening salvo in contract talks with part-owner and operator BHP that makes a quick resolution highly unlikely.
Negotiations still left to resolve – including Escondida – represent about 2.6 million tonnes out of global copper supply
The union represents about 2,500 workers at the mine. Bloomberg interviewed union spokesman Carlos Allendes in Santiago on Wednesday:
“The company would be wrong to remain stubborn in its position that workers should earn less to give that money to shareholders.
"Workers have been educating themselves, we know the mine, the processes and our benefits inside out and they can’t fool us anymore”
The union is demanding a one-time bonus equivalent to 4% of dividends distributed to BHP shareholders in 2017.
Workers have been educating themselves, we know the mine, the processes and our benefits inside out and they can’t fool us anymore
That works out to about $34,000 per worker. It would be the biggest bonus payout to mineworkers ever in Chile and comes on top of a general wage increase of 5%, which is more than double the inflation rate in the South American nation. BHP has until next Friday to respond.
Due to its size, Escondida can on its own change global copper supply dynamics.
BHP, which owns 57.5% of the mine and partner Rio Tinto 30%, has spent nearly $8 billion expanding the mine (including a $3.4bn water plant) in the past five years to maintain output above one million tonnes. 2018 guidance is 1.18–1.23mt, up more than 30okt compared to last year.
That means Escondida, in production since 1990, is responsible for nearly 5% of the world’s primary copper supply.
Last year’s walkout lasted 43 days and ended only when workers invoked a legal provision that allows them to extend their existing contract by 18 months (to end July).
The 2017 strike at Escondida was the longest in Chile since the 74-day action at state-owned Codelco’s El Teniente mine in 1973, which took place shortly before the military coup that overthrew socialist President Salvador Allende.
Short Link:
https://www.miningnews.ir/En/News/189535
Newmont confirmed on Wednesday that two members of its workforce died this week at the Cerro Negro mine located in the ...
Base metals declined after the Federal Reserve pushed back on interest-rate cut expectations and as investors weighed ...
Rescuers on Sunday pulled out all 15 subsistence mine workers who were trapped in an underground shaft at Redwing mine ...
Mining News Pro - Australia expanded its list of critical minerals deemed crucial to its energy transition and national ...
Mining News Pro - China exported small amounts of two minerals crucial to high-tech manufacturing in October, marking a ...
Mining News Pro - Townsville is set to become home to Australia’s first critical minerals processing centre, the ...
Mining News Pro - Mexico’s President Andrés Manuel López Obrador exhorted Vulcan Materials’ subsidiary, Calica, to ...
Mining News Pro - China’s exports of germanium and gallium products in August plunged, customs data showed on Wednesday, ...
Mining News Pro - Some of Mali’s top gold producers said a new law to allow the military-led government to increase its ...
No comments have been posted yet ...