Business News
Myanmar's copper mine resumes production
May 31, 2009, 7:56 GMT
Yangon - Myanmar's only copper mine has resumed production after a year's suspension of operations, the Myanmar Times reported Sunday.
The Monywa mine, one of the biggest copper mines in South-East Asia, halted production in April 2008, shortly after its explosives' contract with an Australian firm expired.
The mine is jointly owned and operated by the Canada's Ivanhoe Group and government's Mining Enterprise No 1.
Myanmar Ivanhoe Copper Company Limited managing director Glenn Ford did not provide details on why the mine stopped production nor why it had restarted this month.
'All I can tell you is that the Monywa project, Myanmar's only copper mine, has restarted operations,' Ford told the Myanmar Times weekly.
'The mine produces copper, which is a strategic metal essential for any infrastructure (development), and (Monywa) is one of the lowest-cost production mines in the world,' he said.
Myanmar, which has been under military rule since 1962, opened the country up to foreign investment in 1989.
The petroleum and mining sectors have attracted foreign investors, although US companies are now prohibited from doing business in Myanmar, also called Burma, by US government sanctions.
Other companies have pulled out or refrained from investments in Myanmar because of the government's poor human rights record and pariah status among Western democracies.
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