TEHRAN- Iranian Mines and Mining Industries Development and Renovation Organization (IMIDRO) announced that it plans to revive 50 idle small copper mines in the current Iranian calendar year (ends on March 20, 2021), IRNA reported.

As reported, reviving these mines will bear many fruitful results for the National Iranian Copper Industry Company.

IMIDRO Head Khodadad Gharibpour has announced that the National Iranian Copper Industry Company has defined copper projects worth 100 trillion rials (about $2.38 billion) to be implemented in the current year.

Among the small copper mines throughout the country, 94 mines are active, 96 mines are idle, and 21 mines are being equipped.

Reviving the small mines was one of the major plans that Iran’s mining sector was seriously pursuing in the past Iranian calendar year (ended on March 19), which was named the year of “Pickup in Production”.

Last year, Gharibpour had mentioned this plan as one of the most significant plans of “Resistance Economy”, saying that IMIDRO was strongly determined to carry out it.

Such strong will resulted in reviving 146 small mines in the previous year, although the planned figure was 150, which did not come true because of the coronavirus pandemic in the last month of the year.

Reviving the small mines is also among the top plans of the country’s mining sector in the current Iranian calendar year, which is named the year of “Surge in Production”.

IMIDRO head has announced that the organization is planning to revive 200 small mines in the present year.

“Given the significance of reviving small mines, we have doubled the organization’s internal budget for the plan to revive small mines in the current year”, Gharibpour announced last week in a meeting on monitoring the plan for reviving and developing the small mines.

According to the official, based on an MOU signed three years ago, 500 small mines were planned to be revived throughout the country in a course of five years to create jobs for 25,000 people.

This year’s slogan of surge in production means that more minerals should be supplied as the feedstock for the industrial units, and it indicates the significance of reviving and developing the small mines (which constitute 98 percent of mines in the country) as some major sources of such supply.

IMIDRO and other related organizations have already announced their support for this plan and the mining sector’s officials have been suggesting different strategies for optimizing implementation of the plan.

MA/MA