Politics
Turning Mine-Ravaged Nauru Green Again
Rehabilitation work to begin next year
Nauru's phosphate mined ravaged face is to slowly turn green again. The repair of what nearly a century of mining has inflicted on the 21-square kilometre island republic, lying 56 kilometres south of the Equator, is expected to begin by the middle of next year.
Over the next 15 to 20 years Nauru's landscape is to be reshaped to become of economic use.
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Almost 90 percent of Nauru's original surface lies spread on farms, mainly in Australia and New Zealand, as the world¹s highest grade phosphate. A deceptive belt of shrubbery 200 to 300 metres wide circles the coast of the island as shade, living space and planting ground for Nauru's inhabitants, among them about 600 mine workers from neighbouring atoll countries of Tuvalu and Kiribati.
Inland, the island is a desert of jagged coral pinnacles up to 10 metres high with summits that once were at ground level. The phosphate lay between them until it was dug out, first by pick axes and shovels by Chinese labourers, and later by mechanical excavators.
Mining by the Pacific Phosphate Company began soon afterwards, first under the island's then German colonial rulers, then after the outbreak of the First World War in 1914, by a British administration, and later by Australia.
Since Nauru became an independent republic in 1968 mining has been operated by a government-owned corporation.
Exports of phosphate reached a peak of 1.9 million tonnes. The present production rate is around 400,000 tonnes. But this could soon drop to only 250,000 tonnes.
Phosphate sales have brought Nauru¹s people hundreds of millions of dollars. The nagging question for them is: What happens after the phosphate, except for fish, their only significant natural resource, runs out? The mining corporation is reluctant to give a firm time for that event. It is preparing an assessment, it says. But knowledgeable people say present known economic reserves will be exhausted in about five years. But mining may carry on for some years after that. Planning for the repair of Nauru's moonscape areas is based on the assumption that by levelling the pinnacles, mining equipment should in some areas be able to reach phosphate now inaccessible to it. With luck, enough phosphate can be extracted from the base of the pinnacles for sales. This could make a significant contribution towards the estimated rehabilitation costs of around A$300 million.
Patrick Goodfellow, a British mining engineer, is in charge of the trial stage of the rehabilitation project. "We intend to put a report in by Christmas," he says. "We are allowing for a period for the government analysis and a three-month period for designing, say the first 70 hectares of work on the 1400 to 1500 hectares to be repaired. "We could use the same time to source equipment so that work could begin as early as the middle of next year." The plan is to progressively knock down thousands of coral pinnacles. Trials are being run with a 180-tonne excavator. Talks of repairing, Nauru have been heard for years, with schemes for importing millions of tonnes of soil, sand rubble and volcanic ash as fill, being floated. "But the government has made a decision not to bring anything in," Goodfellow says.
A A$107 million contribution towards the cost of rehabilitation has come as compensation for areas mined for exports to Australia and New Zealand during the period of British and Australian rule. "There has been an awful lot of mining since then by the Nauruans, and they allowed for a royalty for a rehabilitation fund of A$3.50 a tonne exported.
With that and the Australian money we should be in a fairly good shape."
