Mayur granted coal permit, Papua New Guinea signs up to China’s Belt and Road initiative and Newcrest settles insurance claim. Your weekly digest of the latest business news.
Australian company, Mayur Resources Ltd (MRL), has reportedly been granted an environmental permit to extract coal in Gulf Province. It was given the go-ahead to proceed with an exploration licence (EL1875), owned by its PNG subsidiary Waterford Ltd. This is the first time the Conservation and Environmental Protection Authority has issued an environmental permit for coal bulk sampling in PNG to enable commercial grade shipments.
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Papua New Guinea will become the second Pacific nation to sign up to China’s massive Belt and Road Initiative infrastructure program, further tying Australia’s nearest neighbour to Asia’s economic giant. Meeting in Beijing on Friday, Prime Minister Peter O’Neill reportedly further congratulated China’s President, H.E. Xi Jinping, on his recent re-election as President of China.
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Newcrest has reportedly settled its insurance claim with the company’s insurers in relation to the 14 April 2017 seismic event at the Cadia Valley operation. The settlement amount is US$155 million (K500 million) and all cash has been received. This amount will be included in Newcrest’s Statutory Profit for the 2018 financial year.
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PNG company Norman Finance has set up a branch in Fiji because it views that the Pacific island country’s economy as stable, according to The National. ‘Fiji is the perfect place to expand our first overseas branch because of its stable economy and the people seems trustworthy,’ Managing Director and owner Gabriel Andandi said.
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The national coffee cupping competition returns to Port Moresby in September.
Coffee Industry Corporation will be hosting the national coffee cupping competition in September in Port Moresby. Acting chief executive officer, Steven Tumae said: ‘The competition has run for the last three years [but] was put off in 2017 due to the incursion of the coffee berry borer and the 2017 elections.’ The competition uses the SCAA (Specialty Coffee Association of America) scoring system, which is universally accepted and practiced in the coffee industry.
Meanwhile, a coffee business executive in the Eastern Highlands Province faces a jail term for having failed to repay K85,000 to the CIC this month, according to The Post Courier.
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Treasurer Charles Abel. Credit: The National
The State is fully committed to honouring all the commitments contained in the oil and gas agreements, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Treasury Charles Abel reportedly said last week after his return from Australia. Abel endorsed the statements by Tari-Pori MP and Finance Minister James Marape and Governor Phillip Undialu on the sensitivity, the history and legacy issues of not resolving the landowner identification process.
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The Papua New Guinea government is reportedly defending its attempt to register all its citizens in a central database and issue them with photo ID cards—despite the scheme running into difficulties. According to the ABC’s Pacific Beat, only half a million of PNG’s approximately eight million people have been registered so far.
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PNG’s South Pacific Brewery has won an international award for its South Pacific Export Lager brand. SP Export Lager has won Monde International Quality Institute’s Gold Quality Award nine times since 2006.
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Photograph of the week
The Papua New Guinea government and business delegation, headed by Prime Minister Peter O’Neill, was accorded full ceremonial honours by the Chinese government on their arrival in Beijing to sign the Belt and Road Initiative.
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