Tuesday 21 February 2012

Bidjovagge

Bigjovagge copper and goldmine in placed in a green rock belt in Finnmark, on the border of Troms municipality. The mine is about 2,5 km long, and is located 40 km North-East of Kautokeino. The mine has been exploting copper and gold over two periods of time, and is now planning to reopen. The first period of extraction from 1970-1975 the mine was only extracting copper. When Finish Outokumpu acquired the mine in -84 they started to extract a lot more gold, but because of the low copper price on the market they had to close down.

Today the Swedish firm Artic Gold AB has bought the mine and is planning to operate by 2013. There has been a protest from the indigenous hearding people in the area together with locals and nature environment directorate. Who will win? Will operation in of Bidjovagge take place, or will the indigenous and environmentalists be heard this time?

2 comments:

  1. really interesting to see the scale of the mine put in comparative perspective. What I presume that you´ll do on the study trip is to meet with some of the actors involved in this conflict and I recommend to find out how and where the negotiation and debate is performed. Based on the nomadic lifestyle of the Sami people, the reindeer herders have for centuries traveled through the landscape and lived in Gámi and Lavvo tents. With the development of industry and infrastructure in the Finnmark region the herders have been forced to adjust to the changes in the landscape but one could ask how much change can the herders tolerate on their territory. Are the decisions of mining operation in Bidjovággi been taken in Oslo or Stockholm or Kautokeino? One of the most raised concern by the local people in Kautokeino is if Arctic Gold are going to deliver with the plan (in next september)is an impact assessment that features the traditional knowledge and culture of Sami people. Norwegian KU-plan don´t include such assessment so it would be interesting to hear from local people on the study trip what values they relate to this landscape. This was perhaps too long :) but I look forward to follow this blog

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    Replies
    1. Thank you so much for your comment.
      I really like and appreciate your suggestion on the study trip. You have pointed out some really interesting topics that we can look into. We did try to find out more about Bidjovagge, however, the information about the mine is quite limited, that's also why we made the presentation a bit fragmented.
      We will try to find more afterwards and tell a more complete and interesting story.

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