Andean Group - December 2008 (ISSN 1741-4466)

Luis Alberto Echazú, the mining and metals minister, said that the country's metal exports in 2008 should earn at least US$1.8bn. In 2007 metal exports came to US$1.35bn.Metal prices started rising in 2006, but appeared to peak in July this year. The government has magnified the benefit from higher prices by increasing royalties on metals. Echazú noted that despite the increase in royalties from the start of this year, output volumes had increased significantly in 2008. Echazú admitted that  mining revenues would fall in 2009 because of the slide in metal prices. The slide has been steep. Zinc and tin prices, for example, halved between the first half of 2008 and the end of November 2008. Zinc now sells for about US$0.53 a pound while tin fetches US$5.58 a pound. In January zinc was fetching US$1.08 a pound and in May tin peaked at US$11.56 a pound.

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