Natural resources of Pakistan

[New Resolve]

Why Isnt Reko Dik being mined, it would change the course of the country on its own and should be a top priority.
We should start small and do it on our own but start at least. I seriously doubt that its worth $ trillion though, probably more like $300 billion.

 

[Orakzai]

I would rather give on hand info and would not go in quantitative aspects and would focus minerals in KPK and GB. With regards to Gas and petroleum KPK had major untapped reserves like i would give example of Karak-Kohat-Hangu region which was totally untapped till few years when MOL came and then we saw some series of discoveries which encouraged the Govt to even go for an oil refinery near Karak-Bannu.Same region was rumored to be having quite big deposits of stuff in which PAEC was especially interested. Our Northen areas, Swat, Mohmand Agency etc are specially blessed with Marble,gem stones and other related stuff.But these areas are really under-tapped except Swat in which before TTP there were even cosmetics factories set up which used minerals from mountains there.U must have heared of Lucky cement factory in KPK.Its one of the largest cement factories on Pakistan and when it was being set up it was said that atleast 15 years of raw material is lying in just few kilometres radius of the factory. There is best quality of coal being dug out from coal mines that start from Dara Adam Khel to all the way till inner Orakzai Agency and Kurram Agency. There are many other things in KPK provided peace is established there and U can well extend this model to other provinces.

totally agree to you i mean in our tribal areas some people have become millionaires by digging out coal from the mountains same is happening in Dara Adam khail. now if people can dig out coal it means there is coal coz radius of the whole digging activity is very large which shows that we have huge deposits of minerals right under our feet.

Why Isnt Reko Dik being mined, it would change the course of the country on its own and should be a top priority.
We should start small and do it on our own but start at least. I seriously doubt that its worth $ trillion though, probably more like $300 billion.

Even $300 billion is an insane amount of money my friend.

There may be resources but it will take more money to extract it from the ground than it is worth.

Afghanistan may have $1 trillion + amount of natural resources but it would take $2 trillion to extract it from the ground. Otherwise all companies would be going ballistic at every natural resource rich nation.

LOL mining companies aren't paving a road made up of gold that they would need $2 trillion. more realistic figure would be that in order to extract that $1 trillion worth of natural resources they would probably need $50 billion.

 

[ziaulislam]

There may be resources but it will take more money to extract it from the ground than it is worth.

Afghanistan may have $1 trillion + amount of natural resources but it would take $2 trillion to extract it from the ground. Otherwise all companies would be going ballistic at every natural resource rich nation.

not necessary, countries also look at one major thing..stability..even a resource rich country with instability risk is not a good place for investment.
pakistan is risk country not only in way of actual ground security but in sense of investment risk too, the govt itself is risk factor..we have shown that in 70s , 90s and even recently when a deal in riko diq was canceled apparently for kick backs

Why Isnt Reko Dik being mined, it would change the course of the country on its own and should be a top priority.
We should start small and do it on our own but start at least. I seriously doubt that its worth $ trillion though, probably more like $300 billion.

who will mine it.
we neither have the money or expertise while we killed a well known private investor which will sue any body who tries to extract it

 

[Fracker]

I am not sure how to say, but... Can somebody tell me a single mineral which is/cannot be produced in Pakistan?

So answer is very simple,we have it, but we are way to incompetent to capitalise it properly. If kick out all mining companies or do agreement like iron core in chiniot then Pakistan can earn much more.

Most of the gold, iron, uranium, gypsum, goes to other miner countries without even having check n balance.

 

[Icewolf]

LOL mining companies aren't paving a road made up of gold that they would need $2 trillion. more realistic figure would be that in order to extract that $1 trillion worth of natural resources they would probably need $50 billion.

Do you even know what you're talking about?
Do you even know the technology required to extract minerals deep within the ground?
It's either very expensive to extract natural resources or it takes toouch time. We are talking decades and trillions.

If it was just 50 billion, every company would be going ham in Afghanistan right now. China loves investing in high risk countries, look at investment in Africa by them.

Maybe it'd cost $50 billion in a couple hundred years buddy boy. Right now there's simply insufficient technology to extract their resources at a good cost-benefit ratio.

 

[Icewolf]

not necessary, countries also look at one major thing..stability..even a resource rich country with instability risk is not a good place for investment.
pakistan is risk country not only in way of actual ground security but in sense of investment risk too, the govt itself is risk factor..we have shown that in 70s , 90s and even recently when a deal in riko diq was canceled apparently for kick backs


who will mine it.
we neither have the money or expertise while we killed a well known private investor which will sue any body who tries to extract it

What do you mean not necessarily lol, I was just pointing out ONE reason a company might not invest to mine natural resources.

You pointed out another one

 

[!eon]

No doubt Pakistan is rich in natural resources and ofcourse money is needed to bring these into uses but its not a big deal.
Big deal is corrupt elite.

 

[flameboard]

There are a lot of companies that have invested in Pakistan it may not be leading in the world it's sizeable enough to support Pakistan.

 

[Husnainshah]

I would rather give on hand info and would not go in quantitative aspects and would focus minerals in KPK and GB. With regards to Gas and petroleum KPK had major untapped reserves like i would give example of Karak-Kohat-Hangu region which was totally untapped till few years when MOL came and then we saw some series of discoveries which encouraged the Govt to even go for an oil refinery near Karak-Bannu.Same region was rumored to be having quite big deposits of stuff in which PAEC was especially interested. Our Northen areas, Swat, Mohmand Agency etc are specially blessed with Marble,gem stones and other related stuff.But these areas are really under-tapped except Swat in which before TTP there were even cosmetics factories set up which used minerals from mountains there.U must have heared of Lucky cement factory in KPK.Its one of the largest cement factories on Pakistan and when it was being set up it was said that atleast 15 years of raw material is lying in just few kilometres radius of the factory. There is best quality of coal being dug out from coal mines that start from Dara Adam Khel to all the way till inner Orakzai Agency and Kurram Agency. There are many other things in KPK provided peace is established there and U can well extend this model to other provinces.

Well, where's the problem then? ANP in province and PPP in center and Kiyani in Army are out of power as well.
'Cause the said areas' condition, financial and law and order, highly contradicts with your post.

There may be resources but it will take more money to extract it from the ground than it is worth.

Afghanistan may have $1 trillion + amount of natural resources but it would take $2 trillion to extract it from the ground. Otherwise all companies would be going ballistic at every natural resource rich nation.

I'm not sure if this is the right answer but it seems to be the only logical answer.
I mean why else all the valuable minerals are still only on papers?
But then how do other Natural Resource rich countries extract their minerals?

Any
You are being unrealistic when you say that there is no corruption.

Take Saindak as an example, 50% of the revenues went to the Chinese mining company.

If we can develop nuclear tech then we can also mine on our own, no? This is where incompetency, corruption and lack of vision comes into play.

Except Pakistan hasn't been ruled by one person or one system since it's inception.
I doubt incompetent, corrupt or lacking in vision applies to everyone. If that were the case, Pakistan wouldn't be nuclear state. I disagree with your assessment.

not necessary, countries also look at one major thing..stability..even a resource rich country with instability risk is not a good place for investment.
pakistan is risk country not only in way of actual ground security but in sense of investment risk too, the govt itself is risk factor..we have shown that in 70s , 90s and even recently when a deal in riko diq was canceled apparently for kick backs


who will mine it.
we neither have the money or expertise while we killed a well known private investor which will sue any body who tries to extract it

Billions in Benazir Income support, Metro Bus, Laptop et cetera but Pakistan doesn't have money for extraction?
This only strengthens the person above's view that extracting costs twice the worth of actual mineral.
As for instability, Pakistan wasn't always this unstable. But after the recent Chinese investment, this instability argument holds little to no weight.

 

[shah1398]

Well, where's the problem then? ANP in province and PPP in center and Kiyani in Army are out of power as well.
'Cause the said areas' condition, financial and law and order, highly contradicts with your post.

Actually the MOL was only company who agreed to venture in these projects and that was actually during ANP-PPP-Kiyani trio time. MOL was wise enough to give good job share to locals esp in Karak area where literacy is quite high and thus it secured the support of local population.And regarding the problem part, its upon govt to pump in more and more resources to tap these reserves. The coal mining, the cement factories, marble factories etc are mostly run and has been established by private sector.Govt has given its patronage to Oil and Gas area and that too majority of exploration is done by MOL and share of OGDCL is less as compare to it.Still we have presence of OGCL exploration teams in Lachi near Kohat area as sort of HQ.

Even $300 billion is an insane amount of money my friend.

Saindak and Reko Dik are hell of big projects but underutilized. With legal case being pursued by TCC which was blamed for using unfair means to secure the project, now Reko Dek is almost at stand still...here is some of the technical evaluation given by TCC for the project...

"Reko Diq’s annual production is estimated at 200,000 tons of copper and 250,000 ounces of gold from 600,000 tons of concentrate. At today’s international prices, the profit worked out by Tethyan Copper Company (TCC) is about $1.14 billion for copper and $2.5 billion for gold, totaling $3.64 billion approximately annually. The TCC’s calculation of a $200 billion-plus profit over the 55-year life of the mine is disputed, higher estimates ranging up to $450-500 billion."

The evaluation dates few years back and we can expect some variation in quoted price.

 

[DESERT FIGHTER]

Well, where's the problem then? ANP in province and PPP in center and Kiyani in Army are out of power as well.
'Cause the said areas' condition, financial and law and order, highly contradicts with your post.



I'm not sure if this is the right answer but it seems to be the only logical answer.
I mean why else all the valuable minerals are still only on papers?
But then how do other Natural Resource rich countries extract their minerals?



Except Pakistan hasn't been ruled by one person or one system since it's inception.
I doubt incompetent, corrupt or lacking in vision applies to everyone. If that were the case, Pakistan wouldn't be nuclear state. I disagree with your assessment.



Billions in Benazir Income support, Metro Bus, Laptop et cetera but Pakistan doesn't have money for extraction?
This only strengthens the person above's view that extracting costs twice the worth of actual mineral.
As for instability, Pakistan wasn't always this unstable. But after the recent Chinese investment, this instability argument holds little to no weight.

I have only been to reko diq mines .. But what I say there was very encouraging . On the stones you could literally see gold particles.. I bought back a few stones with the glittery particles.. So yeah.. Atleast Reko Diq mines got Gold.


Coal yes from what I heard it's not of high quality but it could be used for power generation. indians are using the same quality on their side..

 

[Rasengan]

The northern areas of Pakistan have been blessed with an abundance amount of resources. Currently Pakistan exports roughly $200-300 million worth of gems annually which is pathetic, because we have the 5th largest deposits of gems in the world.The cutting technique is primitive, thus Pakistani value added gems have no market internationally since standards are below par on industry requirements. Second the extraction process conducted by miners is through explosives, which damages 70% of gems because they have structural cracks making the product essentially worthless. Unfortunately none of the major players in Pakistan have marketed our gems properly in the international market.

What needs to happen is that private investors should open a small lapidary unit in Peshawar and install high-tech semi automatic faceting machines to cut the gems. Furthermore, even with this machine a person still has to hire an expert in understanding what shape should the gem should be faceted into and how the light needs to reflect across the gem to bring maximum shine. A person can make alot of money in this game, just need to use common sense and sound practices.

 

[livingdead]

No doubt Pakistan is rich in natural resources and ofcourse money is needed to bring these into uses but its not a big deal.
Big deal is corrupt elite.

is it not in the interest of corrupt elite to exploit the natural resource so that they can get their cut?

 

[xyxmt]

we have no infrastructure to mine in Baluchistan and northern areas, few road which are not enough for heavy traffic and no rail system. It would take billions to setup infrastructure that supports the extraction of resources.

 

[VCheng]

Ever since I was born, I'm hearing Pakistan 'Qudrati zakhair se maal-a-maal hai'.

Just now I was going through the list of top 10 Natural Resource rich nations -- Pakistan was nowhere to be seen.

I've personally had discussions with regards to Thar Coal with some coal importers, most's responses weren't very encouraging to put it briefly. Their responses had something to do with low quality of coal.

Don't have any firsthand knowledge on Balochistan natural reserves. But my point being, who in their right minds wouldn't exploit natural resources, which allegedly, would turn out to be a game-changer for Pakistan?

Please don't feed me the rhetorics of corruption, evil politicians, berooni quwwat and what not. Pakistan, in spite of all the hurdles, turned out to be a nuclear power. Exploiting Natural Resources is a walk in the park when Pakistan's successfully capable of going Nuclear against the will of the likes of The U.S, India.

Avoid one-liners and please be realistic.

Let's just say that the reality falls short of the claims.