MMTA at Indaba 2009
In the MMTA’s first presentation to the annual Mining Indaba in Cape Town, Executive Roland Chavasse painted a broad picture of why minor metals are so vital to modern life.
Chavasse’s speech was part of the “Commodities Forum”, traditionally one of the best attended sessions that also looked at gold, copper, PGMs and diamonds.
Mirroring the growth in membership in recent years, significant interest has emerged in minor metals from across the mining community and it should not be surprising that minor metals are increasingly respected as a mineral asset class. The Indaba is one of the mining world’s leading conferences with a particular focus on Africa, home to so many minor metal resources.
In the speech, written with the assistance of many MMTA members, the inelasticity and geopolitical issues found in so many minor metal markets were discussed and illustrated with case studies of cobalt and rhenium.
In conclusion Chavasse stated that those metals have historically been called ‘minor’ are reaching maturity: industrially, economically and politically. “This is only their beginning and I invite you all to the MMTA’s Conference in Istanbul this April to meet the international minor metals community and learn more about these critical elements,” Chavasse said.
