Several years ago, I was poring over copies of The Reminder (then The Daily Reminder) from the 1950s when a banner headline caught my eye.
Don’t quote me on the exact wording, but it read something like “Next gold mine found” and was clearly designed to grab the reader’s attention (or for you cynics out there, sell newspapers).
Reading the article decades after the fact, my impression was that the reporter pretty much got swindled by some bargain-basement exploration company.
Not only did the promised gold mine never come to fruition, claims made by its promoter sounded of the too-good-to-be-true variety.
Of course things were different back then. Newspapers, especially those in small towns, tended to take people at their word more than they do today.
Just as importantly, there were no guidelines – or at least none that I’m aware of – around how mining companies could release information to the public.
So it is easy to envision the Flin Flon of several decades ago – isolated, rich in ore and with spare cash on hand – being targeted by mining charlatans who promise the world in order to make a quick buck through share sales.
Times have changed. Before releasing official data on the ore grades of a deposit, companies today must complete a report that satisfies requirements known as National Instrument 43-101.
NI 43-101 is strict in its standards for how public mining companies can disclose scientific and technical info about mineral projects. It is essentially designed to prevent prospective shareholders, who often know little or nothing about mining, from being ripped off.
But I doubt NI 43-101 has rid Canada entirely of trumped-up mining pronouncements.
Companies are still free to spout optimism about their deposits, as long as they don’t pretend to know their ore body is X per cent gold, Y per cent silver or what have you.
As such, it is natural to wonder just how much actual mining will materialize from the mineral exploration that has proceeded in recent years
in the Flin Flon-Snow Lake region.
At times I have seen a junior miner issue a news release saying something like, “Our deposit is located just X amount of kilometres from the Lalor deposit!” and then launch into a multi-paragraph description of Hudbay’s prized find.
I realize that often the best place to find new deposits is to look around previously discovered ones such as Lalor.
Still, it just seems like some of these companies are trying to subtly suggest their unproven find is of the same world-class calibre as Lalor.
All media should be careful in presenting information on new mineral discoveries. Too much hype too early can needlessly cause people to get their hopes up or, worse, invest their hard-earned dollars in something worthless.
The point here is not to rain on anybody’s parade, but to show that it never hurts to take a grain of salt with news as important to our region as new mineral discoveries.
Mining is this region’s past, present and future. Let’s hope for new finds that benefit us, but let’s not get sucked in to accepting as Gospel every rosy statement from every mining company out there.
Local Angle runs Fridays.
