By Emma Farge
ST GALLEN, Switzerland May 4 (Reuters) – Mining companies
will fight growing resource nationalism and could pull out of
countries where governments are demanding too large a share of
the pie, commodities giant Glencore warned on Fri day, a
day after Argentina nationalised the country’s biggest oil firm.
“The mining industry is forming tight groups among each
other on how we are going to fight it…,” Glencore Chief
Executive Ivan Glasenberg said.
Glasenberg, speaking at a conference in the Swiss town of St
Gallen, warned there would be consequences to producer countries
seeking an ever larger share of mining profits, a trend which
has risen alongside commodity prices as the main mining
constituencies raise taxes and royalties.
Glasenberg, whose company is in the throes of a tie-up with
miner Xstrata, warned Glencore would not hesitate to
withdraw investments in places like Africa if governments change
the terms of existing contracts in their favour.
“African states are going to have to be very careful because
there are minerals all over Africa and if they start this
nationalism or if they start taking a bigger profit, we will go
elsewhere,” he said.
Glencore, the world’s largest diversified commodities
trader, operates across Africa, with key production assets on
the continent in South Africa, the Democratic Republic of Congo,
Zambia and Equatorial Guinea.
Glasenberg also said Xstrata, the FTSE 100 miner in which it
has a share of almost 34 percent, was holding back on the big
copper investment in Argentina.
“That won’t happen for the moment,” Glasenberg said at a
conference session on emerging market risks.
Continued…
