By Mary Powers
LIMA, Peru (Reuters) - The Peruvian government has asked a
subsidiary of Canadian junior Manhattan Minerals
Manhattan presented the environmental impact study in December and said it hopes to start spending $180 million by late 2003 on the first phase of the project's development.
But Vice-Minister of Mines Cesar Polo said the 120-day period foreseen by law for approving or rejecting the environmental impact study had been frozen until Manhattan submits the missing information.
"There is long list (of requirements) which includes a surface water study, study of air quality and other base line studies," Polo said at a news conference.
The Energy and Mines Ministry distributed copies of a letter to Manhattan from the National Institute of Natural Resources (Inrena) asking for copies of 12 baseline studies. Inrena said "an appropriate analysis" of the project's potential environmental impact was impossible without them.
Americo Villafuerte, president of Manhattan Compania Minera, said the company would provide the information.
"The studies exist and we have no problem whatsoever in providing the information," Villafuerte told Reuters.
MINING VS. FARMING?
Tambo Grande is considered to be a world-class project but the mineral-rich deposit lies beneath a small farming town.
Manhattan's plan to develop a mine in a fertile farming valley some 640 miles (1,050 km) north of Peru's capitaL, has triggered a bitter row with locals who say it would derail the farming industry and soil the environment.
That valley -- an irrigated pearl in arid northern Peru -- produces 40 percent of Peru's mangoes and limes.
Manhattan has until May to exercise the option on the project. Energy and Mines Minister Jaime Quijandria said at the news conference, however, the ministry would be flexible in extending the deadline if necessary.
Quijandria also proposed that the Ombudsman's office, Oxfam and Transparencia, a local non-governmental organization, could act as facilitators in the public hearings process.
"They could be the launching point so that they (Tambogrande residents) see that the ministry is not pressuring in favor of Manhattan's interests," Quijandria said. "These are three institutions in which the population has confidence."
Oxfam financed a referendum in Tambogrande in June in which an overwhelming majority of voters rejected the project.
NEW PROCEDURES ON PUBLIC HEARINGS
Quijandria announced new prodedures for the process of public hearings on environmental impact studies for mining and energy projects.
In the past, environmental activists have criticized the process for failing to allow participation of the populations in areas near the projects.
The new rules include consultations with the population prior to the public hearings, better access to copies of environmental impact studies, increased citizen participation in the hearings, including language interpretation, and more input from regional authorities.
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