3 Jul 2013

BCL to buy local in Bougainville mine relaunch, says Momis

3:11 pm on 3 July 2013

The autonomous government in the Papua New Guinea province of Bougainville says it will require a rejuvenated Bougainville Copper Ltd to source most of its basic supplies from within the province.

There are increasing expectations that the huge mine, which has been shut down for 24 years, will re-open.

A series of fora have mostly backed the re-opening and the Autonomous Bougainville Government president John Momis says he hopes they can begin negotiations with BCL before the end of the year.

He wants the re-construction happening quickly to stimulate job growth and boost the economy.

Mr Momis says they expect this building phase would foster subsidiary industries, including farming.

"Because once the mine starts this time around we are not going to allow BCL to import everything from outside. They will have to buy our beautiful fruits, pineapples, fish, chickens - we will have piggery farms and so on and so forth. But that needs a bit of funding and technology to get the people to be professionally prepared."

The president of the Autonomous Bougainville Government, John Momis