New Zealand's mining sector is expecting the National-led Government to continue introducing more "mining friendly" policies as it promotes doubling the industry's annual output in value from $2 billion to $4 billion.
Gold's high prices during the past year and lignite and methane gas exploration, especially around Otago and Southland, have prompted renewed interest in the sector.
This week in Queenstown, about 250 delegates from around the country and Australia will be attending the 43rd New Zealand branch conference of the Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (AusIMM).
Opening the conference tomorrow will be Queenstown Mayor Clive Geddes, followed by Minister of Energy and Resources Gerry Brownlee and Solid Energy chief executive Don Elder. AusIMM organiser Roger Gregg said under the previous Labour-led government, the mining sector was "set back" by combined Labour and Green Party interests.
National is now seeking to revise the Resource Management Act and is contributing, through its agencies, to local authorities becoming involved in working directly with the mining sector.
"Local authorities have recognised that there is the potential there for economic benefits," Mr Gregg said.
He said councils in Northland and the several on the West Coast, in conjunction with the Foundation for Research, Science and Technology and Crown Minerals had banded together to fund the revision of existing data and to look at economic benefits.
An example of local authorities recognising the benefits of exploration was the Otago Regional Council's $1 million contribution to the $4 million airborne geophysical survey in 2007 by Glass Earth Gold, which covered 1.3 million ha.
ORC chief executive Graeme Martin is scheduled to brief delegates on the outcome of the survey from the regional council's perspective, which includes identification of water resources.
"The resource sector is actually growing at a time when the rest of the country is in recession," Mr Gregg said.
Some of the companies representing the resource sector during the week include L&M Coal Seam Gas, Pike River Coal, Solid Energy, Newmont Waihi Golds, East Otago-based Oceana Gold Corp, as well as a large representation of academics from several universities including the University of Otago, and industry lobby groups, the New Zealand Minerals Association and Straterra.
One controversial speaker will be professor of geology Ian Plimer, of Adelaide University, who rejects mainstream climate change assertions, saying climate change is a geographic and historical event and has little to do with carbon emissions.
The conference includes field trips around Waihi, in the North Island, throughout the earlier part of the week, and visits to Oceana Gold's Macraes mine and L&M Group's Southland coal, methane and coal bed methane sites after the formal conclusion of the conference.
• Reporter Simon Hartley is a guest of AusIMM during the conference.
