Ministry submits bill to raise threshold for strategic gold deposits to 250 t
MOSCOW. Feb 25 (Interfax) - Russia's Natural Resources and Environment Ministry has submitted a bill to the government to amend the law on subsurface resources by raising the threshold at which gold deposits are deemed of federal importance from 50 tonnes to 250 tonnes, Minister Sergei Donskoi said at a meeting of the general council of business lobby group Delovaya Rossiya.
He also said his ministry plans to introduce thresholds for classifying deposits of federal importance for those resources where such thresholds are not yet in place.
The ministry is also proposing to exclude resource blocks with only manifestations of minerals from the list of those deemed of federal importance. "Quite a few small properties with only manifestations of minerals have gotten onto the list. This kills investment interest in them," Donskoi said.
This initiative will first of all apply to deposits of diamonds and rare-earth metals. "In order to clean out this list we have prepared a bill to exclude resource properties with manifestations from the list," the minister said.
