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Subsector spotlight: Mining and Minerals

With robust natural resources stretching from the Canadian Cordillera to the North Atlantic, Canada’s mining industry includes exploration, mining and related support activities, primary

processing, and downstream product manufacturing. Thanks to a strong focus on sustainable exploration and production, this industry is a mainstay of the Canadian economy, supporting jobs and economic activity in every region.

Success stories:

Some 1,200 mineral exploration companies are located in resource-abundant British Columbia, with approximately 800 headquartered in Vancouver, including Teck Resources Limited and Goldcorp Inc., two of the world’s largest mining companies.

RioTinto has developed world-class engineering technology to hold back the waters of Lac de Gras in the Northwest Territories (in order to reach Diavik’s diamond-bearing pipes at the bottom of the lake) in a way that minimizes disturbance. Once RioTinto has built the embankment, creating a pool of water within the lake, it will pump millions of litres from this pool back into the lake, monitoring water quality and fish stocks.

The Sudbury regreening initiative is recognized throughout the world as a best practice in environmental remediation of industrial damaged ecosystems, including the planting of more than 14 million trees.

Sudbury is a proven testing site for the adoption of battery/electric vehicles and technologies for the mining industry. The city’s NORCAT Underground Test Mine serves as a unique training facility, as well as a testing and demonstration site for mining innovation.

The world’s first nickel hydrometallurgical processing plant, owned by Vale, is located in Newfoundland and Labrador.