MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Chile private copper sector overtakes government mines

Chile's private copper mining company Minera Escondida surpassed the traditionally dominant state-owned CODELCO in copper production and revenue for the first time in the first economic semester of 2008, Chilean daily El Mercurio reported this last weekend.

Extracting 725,177 tons of copper between January and June, Minera Escondida is now the largest producing local mining company. As for earnings, Escondida made 3.897 billion US dollars while CODELCO made 3.281 billion, a profit difference of nearly 600 million. This figure represents a 10.4% increase in revenues for the private mining company from the same time period of 2007. Specialists attribute Escondida's success to the record high copper prices in the last six months. CODELCO has responded, saying that production and revenue figures of both companies are not comparable because the Escondida mine is much younger and has much greater ore content than what is now available at CODELCO's much older mining sites. CODELCO still owns 20% of the world's copper reserves, a figure that Minera Escondida cannot match. Minera Escondida is a private Chilean company that is controlled by various international corporations. Australian BHP Billiton owns the majority with 57.5%, while Rio Tinto PLC owns 30%, the Japanese Jeco Corporation owns 10%, and the International Finance Corporation (an affiliate of the World Bank) owns 2.5%. The Santiago Times