Miners have always known there is gold in “them there hills” around East Otago.
But now, GNS Science has created a new geological map of the area, showing exactly where it is.
The mapping project was done in collaboration with the University of Otago and OceanaGold, and has provided deeper insight of major earth structures and a new interpretation of the major gold-producing feature in the Hyde-Macraes Shear Zone.
So, were is the map? Or is this just lending more weight to Oceana Gold to steal more of our gold & ship it off shore? Shouldn’t NZ gold stay in the country, or at least our country benefit from it financially. Or have our governments sold out to the overseas masters for a pittance of its worth?
JW 
As much as i agree with you that it should stay in nz. Sadly its the big internationals that have the money to bank roll the large hard rock mines. There would be few if any nz companies who could do it or are interested enough to roll the dice on doing it.
And a fair bit of the money does stay in nz with wages and supplies etc. one of my old positions in the u/g at mcraes is now paying $140k a year and they have 3or 4 people on the different crews doing it. Drillers are on 200-300k a year after bonuses. And there was 6 of them on each crew with 4 crews i think there wasn’t huge profits to be had after all the different costs were covered.
I do wish it was easier/cheaper for small owner operator alluvial mines to be granted. Permits for memory are around 50k per hectare per year plus royalties plus resource consents. Makes it hard for anyone to make a go of it
Trouble with our governments is that no one seems accountable. If government got involved in say a state owned hard rock gold mine they would make a meal of it, or get ripped off by who ever they “employed/contracted” to run it, & like you say that would be overseas expertise. I believe the Government put up $13 million towards the re-opening of the Blackwater mine below Waiuta. I am not saying that is a bad thing but that is OUR tax payers money. The Government has open purse strings when they think something is a good idea but if their venture fails, no matter what it is, it is the tax payer & country that ultimately suffers & pays the price.
Look back at NZ Rail when the Government sold a lemon to an Australian company who picked the cream out of it & then was going to close a lot of the lines. So the Government bought it back. Oh, sorry, the tax payer bought it back.
Lets not forget the Pike River Coal Mine. Owned by Solid Energy, the NZ Government. Who’s head rolled for that? No ones. Not even the CEO’s. Peter Whittle. But the rest of the country “paid” with the all of a sudden stringent health & safety BS that followed. Funny over time how that has kind of relaxed.
I am involved the the building game & health & safety went way overboard. I won’t go into details but it sure put the price of building a house through the roof. No pun intended. Yet the Govt bangs on about affordable housing. No such thing. I feel sorry for younger generations. Owning their own house is but a dream. That’s if you are just an average wage earner. I better stop. Got a bit carried away. Sorry. Rant over. Have a nice day. I am off for a detect.
JW
