TO BOOM OR NOT TO BOOM?

MINERAL
RESOURCES IN THE ASIAN CENTURY
Gavin Mudd considers the economic, social and environmental impacts of

resources
Australia's mining boom as the nation rushes to meet Asia's demand for

THE CONVERSATION

he 20th century belonged to the West not only

N in military terms but primarily in resource consumption. This century is expected to be dominated
by Asia.
Given the generally high per capita consumption ofa

range of resources by developed nations, we must ask a

fundamental question: can the world provide the same

material standards ofliving for Asia without bankrupting
the global ecological bank?

Australia and Brazil have both found

massive iron ore resources and now

dominate seabome global iron ore exports.

Surprisingly, the answer can be either yes or no

depending on ones point of view (as Obi Wan famously

47

opined). Optimists point to the history of continually

growing mineral and metal production and economic
resources throughout the 20th century and say no

and mineral production. Prominent examples include the

their friends.

ores (now widely used in Copper, leadzinc, nickel, gold

production and consumption ofnon-renewable resources

in gold mining, solvent extraction-electrowinning

technology, safer and cheaper explosives, bigger and bigger

worries. Technology, exploration and economics are

it

Pessimists decry the near exponential growth of

and claim such patterns are inherently unsustainable.

Simple mathematics and environmental limits are their
focus.
Realists see the merit in both points of view.

BOOM TIME
Let us explore the nature of economic mineral
resources. in todays world, we mine fossil fuels, base
metals, precious metals, ferrous metals, light metals, energy

metals and a wide variety of miscellaneous minerals and

metals a signicant majority of the known elements.

Although some elements are abundant throughout
Earths crust, such as iron or aluminium, all minerals

need to be found in deposits both high in concentration

and easy to process to be worth mining.

Throughout the past two centuries, the world has

been scoured for new deposits which could be protable

to mine and in many countries the mining industry

continues to nd more. For example, Australia and Brazil

have both found massive iron ore resources and now

dominate seaborne global iron ore exports. Parts ofAfrica

;-,~,~,

now look set to repeat this pattern.

On the technology front, major advances in mining

and ore processing have enabled breakthroughs in metal

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development of oatation technology for metal sulde

mining). carbon in pulp technology which uses cyanide

diggers and trucks, more efficient grinding technology,
and so on.

On the social front, community opposition

to projects and commodities is growing and

placing substantial pressure on the ability of

the mining industry to develop new projects.

On the economic front, the longterm trend is continually growing demand to meet consumption patterns.

There can be the occasional hiccup during an economic

downturn, but the trend is inexorably up boom times

aplenty for a miner.
Global per capita steel consumption has increased

from 150 kg per capita in 2001 to 203 kg per capita in

2010. Allow for growing consumption in Chinas 1.3 billion

people and India's 1.2 billion people (not to forget Africas

billion people or South Americas halfa billion). New cities

are born, infrastructure built, manufactured goods made

and exported the sheer scale ofcurrent and prospective

future demand for minerals and metals is indeed stark.

Australia's Engagement with Asia

27