Canadian High Commissioner to Guyana Charles Court has said that relations between Guyana and Canada in the mining sector have benefited from the clear setting out by the Government of Guyana and the Guyana Geology and Mines Commission (GGMC) of the regulations within which they expect mining activity to take place.
Court said that Canadian mining companies respect those regulations and that they want to work within the confines set out within them.
“Canada is a country that has had its own experiences with the development of large-scale mining and the impact that it has on indigenous people. It has not always been a simple, straightforward or happy history. We have learnt from those experiences and are still going through the very extensive process of according the appropriate respect to the first nations in Canada over a whole series of issues including recognizing their rights to minerals and other assets,” Court said.
Court told Stabroek Business that for that reason when Canadian mining companies come to Guyana “they are always sensitive to these issues and are prepared and eager to work with communities and to respond to what the communities see as important to themselves.”
Canada has taken several widely publicised initiatives to promote responsible mining practices that seek to take account of the rights of indigenous peoples and of the need to promote mining practices that preserve the physical environment. In March the Canadian High Commission in Georgetown hosted a forum on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) which focused largely on the experiences of the mining sector in Canada on promoting environmentally sustainable mining practices including a responsiveness on the part of mining companies to the rights and the welfare of indigenous communities.
Asked whether the mining sector in Guyana can learn from the Canadian experience Court said that the desirable approach to creating a responsible mining regime had to evolve out of “exchanges of information and experience” rather than any one country learning from another. He said that Canada itself was still going through “a very extensive process” of addressing a number of issues relating to the rights of its own indigenous peoples and making the right sorts of arrangements with them relating to mining and rights.
Court told Stabroek Business that Canadian mining companies have had “a good experience’ in Guyana and that they wanted that experience to continue. “Companies have been sensitized over the years, through their experiences in Canada and elsewhere to work closely with communities and with governments,” he added.
