A total 36,600 hectares of land in Suina and Mulukuku will be set aside for mining exploitation, without any known environmental impact studies.
HAVANA TIMES – On World Earth Day, April 22nd, the regime of Daniel Ortega officially awarded a Chinese company a 25-year concession to mine 36,610 hectares of land in the municipalities of Siuna and Mulukukuu. Despite this large area now set aside for mining in Nicaragua’s North Caribbean Autonomous Region, the project has undergone no known environmental impact studies.
The concession was awarded to the company called “Nicaragua Xinxin Linze Mining Group,” represented by Edward Xiang Liu. The concession is: “for the exploitation of metallic and non-metallic minerals in the zone called Nuevo Bijagual, with an area of (…) 36,610 hectares,” according to the Ministry of Energy and Mines’ official certification published in La Gaceta, the Nicaraguan government Gazette.
According to the certification signed by Estela Martinez, Ministry of Energy and Mines vice minister, the concession was granted after fulfillment of “all the cadastral requirements of the law [establishment of exact boundaries],” and after consultation with the Regional Council of the North Caribbean Coast, which gave its approval (..) on February 16, 2024.”
The Nicaragua Xinxin Linze Mining Group “has at hand the required documents indicating their financial and technical capability to develop and carry out the mining activities within their concession,” the Ministry of Energy and Mines notice asserted.
In exchange for the concession, the Nicaragua Xinxin Linze Mining Group will pay the Nicaraguan government US 0.25 cents for every hectare in the first year, a quantity that will gradually be increased until it reaches 12 dollars/hectare on the eleventh year.
In addition, the government will receive 3% of the value of the extracted substances, for the rights to extraction and royalties.
Environmental studies unknown
Regarding this mining concession, environmentalist Amaru Ruiz, director of the outlawed NGO Fundacion del Rio [“River Foundation”]. pointed out that there are no kno