Jamaican government still firm about sustainable exploitation of mineral resources

The sustainable extraction of Jamaica’s mineral resources that will help the community still seems to be a crucial policy objective of the Government as is often expressed by the Minister of Science, Technology, Energy and Mining Phillip Paulwell, despite the recent suspension of the red mud project.

A Japanese company, Nippon Light Metals had invested US$ 5 million to set up a state-of-the-art pilot plant last year, completely financed by the company that looked into profitable extraction of rare-earth minerals from bauxite waste. There were even talks of commercialization of the project but due to unfavorable market conditions, both parties agreed to suspend the project.

The full ownership of the project was transferred to the Jamaica Bauxite Institute (JBI).

Now JBI has taken up the project with Nippon Light continuing to provide support in regard to the technical expertise in bauxite red mud mineral extraction through an official collaboration agreement formalized to accommodate two-year research and development program.

To protect the interests of both the parties, a patent application agreement is also introduced.

The ownership of the project will be 50-50 with JBI owning 50% on behalf of the government while Nippon Lights will own the intellectual property as in the patent rights for the new technologies.

The pilot facility, which is almost a gift from Nippon Lights to the Jamaican government, will also be used to conduct a wide range of related experiments.