Govt, mining company wrangle over Kokoda Track
By PNG correspondent Steve Marshall
Posted Sat Nov 17, 2007 12:29pm AEDT
Updated Sat Nov 17, 2007 12:43pm AEDT
The Owen Stanley Ranges
Frontier Resources currently has an exploration licence near the Kokoda Track (File photo). (AAP: Lloyd Jones)
* Audio: Aust Govt, company at odds over Kokoda mining plan (AM)
Papua New Guinea's Kokoda Track is the site of a new battle. This time, it's a struggle between mining and military heritage.
Brisbane-based company Frontier Resources wants to dig up part of the track to mine gold and copper. But the Australian Government maintains that it is sacred ground for our war veterans.
Frontier Resources currently has an exploration licence near the track and the company's managing director Peter McNeil is fighting for it to be renewed by the PNG Government.
"We currently have a valid exploration licence. We have met all the terms required for it, and I believe that it will be renewed," he said.
Frontier aims to be mining near the southern end of the track by 2012 but Mr McNeil says he feels like the company is being bullied by the Australian Government.
Production will force the track to be diverted for a couple of kilometres, upsetting many in Australia.
The 96-kilometre path is already a designated reserve area, but in PNG that does not count for much.
Consultant Ross Hopkins recently carried out a sustainable development scoping study along the track for the Australian Government.
"That level of protection is not necessarily effective in certain areas," he said.
"There's local communities ... within that reserve area at a small-scale level, and the track itself sometimes changes slightly one way or another.
"So that limited protection does provide some protection, but it's not sufficient in terms of longer-term sustainability."
Plans for world heritage listing
Australia has promised $16 million to help the track gain world heritage listing. That might involve protecting large areas of land on either side of it.
Mr McNeil says that will affect more than just his company.
"It also covers logging, agriculture," he said. "I don't know what level it goes down to, but it could even come down to what the landowners can actually do on their own land."
Trekkers are divided on the potential disruption to the track caused by any mining.
"I'm here because of... what occurred in 1942, what our boys did and I'd be very disappointed just to see the trail suffer for the mining," one said.
Another trekker says people take various routes when they visit the Kokoda track.
"We have maps and people told us where it used to go, like this is where it went to Myola, and this one you used to go through Kagi or not, and we went another way. People just seem to take different tracks," she said.
"Maybe it's a matter of making it a bit of a political football."
The referee that decides this match is the PNG Government: it alone decides who mines where.
It has now heard from all the stakeholders and will make a decision soon as to whether mining or tourism will be the winner.