Saudi Arabia has revised the estimate of its untapped mineral resources, including phosphates, gold and rare earths, to $2.5 trillion, against the forecast of $1.3 trillion in 2016. Minister of Industry and Mineral Resources of Saudi Arabia, Bandar Alkhorayef said at the World Defense Show organized in Riyadh, Reuters wrote.

The publication notes that the mining industry is part of the far-reaching goals of Saudi Arabia’s capital Al Riyadh, according to which the country aims to build an economy that will not rely heavily on the oil industry alone, but will include the exploitation of vast reserves of phosphate, gold, copper and bauxite.

According to the publication, Saudi Arabia also plans to issue more than 30 mineral exploration licenses to international investors this year.

“They want to simultaneously develop machine building and equipment construction in their economy, and raw materials are needed for these sectors. Countries with copper, iron and other minerals try not to import them, but to use them locally,” economist Suren Parsyan said in an interview with Iravaban.net .

According to a Reuters report, Alkhorayef said that the 10% increase in estimates was due to the addition of rare earth minerals, which are important for electric vehicles and high-tech products. “We believe that currently our reserve potential has increased by 90%.”

Alkhorayef also previously announced plans to shift from exploration and industrial activities to refining and production activities. In contrast to this, Armenia is not very inclined to develop the mining sector in the country.

“There are countries that work with secondary raw materials, for example, there are a number of European concepts that force countries to use approximately 50 percent of raw materials. For example, if 50 tons of iron is produced, 25 tons of it must be reused. In other words, they pose the problem of recycling garbage,” Suren Parsyan says.

Hasmik Harutyunyan, Pablic Relations and Marketing expert

In an interview with Iravaban.net, Public Relations and Marketing Expert Hasmik Harutyunyan states that Saudi Arabia, being one of the richest countries in the world, competes with many neighboring countries, especially Qatar, and wants to be like Qatar and surpass it.

According to Hasmik Harutyunyan, currently, Saudi Arabia is following the same path, wants to conduct serious mega-projects in their country as well. According to the developed strategy, by 2030, Saudi Arabia should become one of the world’s tourist centers and receive 150 million tourists annually: tourism accounts for only 10 percent of Saudi Arabia’s economy.

In parallel with this, the Minister of Industry and Mineral Resources of Saudi Arabia emphasized that Saudi Arabia can be a suitable place for the development of various minerals: “Because we see that the minerals that are mined in Africa are being processed here.”

It turns out that tourism and mining can also be combined. Many people think that mining harms nature, there is a high probability of cancer in such places, which is not even scientifically proven (the causes of oncological diseases are not related to the economic orientation of the settlements ), tourists do not want to visit such places, etc.

Suren Parsyan, Economist

Speaking about the correct organization of the mining industry, Suren Parsyan mentions the regional economy, which is now one of the modern trends. Armenia has also joined it and must take certain steps.

“The regional economy can be the link between the mining industry and sustainable economy, green economy. In other words, the state should invest money in the direction of processing raw materials and metals so that nature is not harmed. The state should also take steps to process the mineral accumulated in the tailings. We have minerals accumulated during the decades: including gold, copper, etc. Their processing is expensive, but the state can subsidize it and still do it so that not too many tails accumulate.

Conditionally: suppose 5000 dollars should be spent for the processing of one ton of mineral and a benefit of 2000 dollars should be obtained from it, the state should subsidize those 3000 dollars in order to eliminate the tailings dump. Steps should be taken in this direction,” the specialist explains.

A number of myths and stereotypes about mining and other sectors operating in each country must be broken in the same way that the world famous soccer player Lionel Messi breaks them with his kicks. He signed a contract with the Saudi Arabia Tourism Department, according to the New York Times; the deal cost $25 million.

“If you remember, years ago we read news in the press about life, traditions and lifestyle in Saudi Arabia, which shocked the public. Naturally, with such an image, it is impossible to submit an application for the holding of world-scale events. It is for this reason that in Saudi Arabia they realized that they should first of all raise the country’s image and rating and spend huge amounts of money on PR and marketing in order to make Saudi Arabia a touristic country,” Hasmik Harutyunyan says. 

It should also not forget that the 2023 European Weightlifting Championship was held on was held in Yerevan, Armenia on 15-23 April, 2023. In addition, the International Boxing Federation (IBA) granted Armenia the right to host the 2023 World Youth Championship, which also became a reality in September.

“If the country has a very good image, a large tourist flow, naturally any mega project will become a reality in the case of existing resources and finances. This is not a one-day or one-year project, and it is impossible to notice the result at once,” Harutyunyan says.

The same can be said about mining. The result of such projects cannot be seen from the first moment. However, we should not forget about the upcoming years and the impact it left.

“We have a law according to which a reclamation fund should be created, where a part of the taxes paid by mining organizations should be accumulated, which should be used later to restore the environmental landscape of that mine.

Political will, finances, culture change are necessary for sustainable development. If, for example, the copper-molybdenum plant of Kajaran implements such a project, and the other company does not do something similar, it will not work. There should be unified rules of the game,” Suren says Parsyan.

Alisa Chilingaryan