THERE are suspicions that Guyanese may be smuggling mercury to Suriname, a country which has banned the use of the chemical.
Although the information is anecdotal, the situation will be carefully monitored, said Minister of Natural Resources, Raphael Trotman in an invited comment on Thursday.
“When I look at the figures, I am amazed at the volume of mercury that has been imported into Guyana recently and given the amount of gold we are getting, this mercury cannot all be used in Guyana,” said the minister, adding that he has a suspicion that it might be going elsewhere.
Trotman believes that all the mercury that is imported cannot be used and he is unaware if it is being stockpiled for some other reason. Gold has been short of its target so far, which indicates that the miners, especially the larger ones, might have under produced.
And two of the largest gold mining companies, Troy Resources and Aurora Gold Mining Inc. do not use mercury in their operations, the minister said, adding that mercury is mostly used by medium and small scale miners in their operations.
While it is yet unclear who the smugglers are, if any, the ministry has started to work closer with Suriname to investigate it. The Minister of Natural Resources of Suriname is expected to be in Guyana for a bilateral discussion with Government on August 20, 2018. Among the issues to be discussed is the recent suspicion of the smuggling of mercury.
The smuggling of gold has and continues to be an issue that is being addressed by the ministry and if the assumption is true, the smuggling of mercury would also be closely monitored.
Trotman had recently refused the importation of 30,000 kg of mercury into Guyana from Mexico as the Government continued to make strides towards the reduction of the toxic metal’s use in gold mining.
“I can add as well that I stopped, restricted, or refused the importation of 30,000 kg of mercury into Guyana.” “The Government of Mexico contacted me about the ship, which they were being asked to approve, and I have refused to accept it because it is a lot of mercury and I am concerned about the use of mercury in our rivers and poisoning the people of Guyana, and of course we had it come home in a real and dangerous way to the employees of GGMC,” Trotman explained.
Despite his decision, GGMC subsequently went ahead and approved the importation of thousands of kilograms of mercury. The minister has since written to the GGMC requesting an explanation.
