Berong mine’s recovery seen completed within schedule

BERONG Nickel Corp. (BNC) may finish the rehabilitation of its Palawan mine within the next four years, the top official of its parent company DMCI Mining Corp. said on Thursday.

“We have four years left to complete it,” DMCI Mining President Tulsi Das C. Reyes told reporters. “Whether we eat up the last four years, we eat up the last four years and if we can turn it over, we’ll turn it over.”

Mr. Reyes, who is also Berong Nickel’s president, said the rehabilitation of the Palawan mine site is ahead of schedule at a 77% completion rate.

“We are ahead of time. We’re ahead of schedule. What we’re doing now is we are still planting and then we have to [continue] benching for the soil stabilization,” he added.

He said the company had spent about P80 million out of the P130 million budget allocated for the depleted mine’s rehabilitation.

He added that another P50 million may be added to the budget to accommodate the increase in fuel prices.

Mr. Reyes said earlier that the site had completed 88% of its annual land preparation target in just six months. It had rehabilitated about 30 hectares of the mine, out of the 34-hectare full-year target.

The Palawan mine was set for a six-year rehabilitation after its depletion in 2021.

BNC started rehabilitation works in June 2022 covering 109 hectares of surface mine, 209 hectares of silt control structures, and 25 hectares of stockpile area.

Mr. Reyes added that the Mines and Geosciences Bureau (MGB) said the site would be presented as a “commendable final mine rehab plan.”

“I want to make sure that when they showcase it, it’s as close to perfect as possible. There’s no incentive for us to finish early, so let’s do it right,” he said.

During its operation between 2006 to 2021, the Berong mine yielded about 10.3-million wet metric tons of nickel ore and 2.6-billion worth of mining duties, royalties, and taxes.

The mining operation also created 1,634 direct and indirect jobs during its active period.

Also on Thursday, another DMCI Mining subsidiary, Zambales Diversified Metals Corp. (ZDMC), reported that its nickel ore production surged by 83% to 1.31 wet metric tons (WMT) from January to September due to increased mining capacity.

“This, after ZDMC received the necessary Environmental Compliance Certificate (ECC) to boost its nickel ore production from 1 million metric tons to 2 million metric tons starting January 2023,” it said in a disclosure by DMCI Holdings, Inc.

For the third quarter, ore production went up by 28% to 190,000 WMT from 149,000 WMT. — Adrian H. Halili