The competitiveness mining of Peru continues to decline, according to a study by the economic consulting firm Macroconsult, which placed it in last place when compared to six other major competing countries in the region and the world in terms of this mining activity.
In 2019, the Mining Competitiveness Index (ICM) of seven countries was measured, where Peru ranked sixth before Colombia, but following Australia, Canada, South Africa, Chile and Mexico (in that order).
Three years later, Peru went from sixth to seventh, following Colombia, “due to a worse performance in the geological and social environment pillars,” according to Macroconsult.
Mining competitiveness does not allow Peru to be seen as attractive for investment. Only in 2021 there were 11,240 million dollars in investments, of which 5,818 million dollars were concentrated in the seven countries, mentioned at the beginning of the note, including Peru.
Of the more than 5 billion dollars, Peru only captured 8% of the total, when in 2019, it got 14% of the amount attracted by the same group of seven countries.
Full procedures and social conflicts
“Because our procedures are more complex than other countries, that is one, two and the handling of the conflicts Social issues have become even more complicated for us because the government set aside its constitutional obligation to maintain free movement on the roads”, said Gonzalo Tamayo, representative of Macroconsult.
Regarding red tape, the study revealed that 90% believe that approval procedures of the permits needed to develop mining activities are complicated or very complicated and they expect it to get worse.
In addition, for 67% of the companies surveyed, social conflict is in a bad or very bad situation.