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Crown Minerals reflections on 2004
4 December 2004 - At the start of 2004, Crown Minerals emerged from a previous year that had seen major changes to the structure and personnel of the Group. With such extensive change it would have been unsurprising if this year had been one of steady consolidation. However, as the list of achievements below shows, 2004 has been a year of exciting developments and significant milestones.
First Quarter:
- Established national call centre (0508 CMESTATE) to deal with routine client inquiries.
- Hosted a record attendance at the NZ Petroleum Conference in Auckland.
- Represented New Zealand at the PDAC conference in Toronto.
- The award of 13 new exploration permits in the Taranaki blocks offer ($130m of committed work).
- The granting of the Favona Gold Mining Permit.
Second Quarter:
- Successfully lead a review by officials of exploration incentives culminating in reduced royalties and tax changes.
- Represented NZ at the APPEA conference in Canberra.
- Represented NZ at the Paydirt Gold conference in Perth.
- Launched new-look, electronic Petroleum News and Petroleum Updates to industry.
- Established Guidelines for industry on the role of Crown Minerals – “Advocacy of the Crown Mineral Estate in Planning Processes under the Resource Management Act 1991”.
Third Quarter:
- Secured Government backing for a $15M seismic data acquisition project.
- Supported and presented at the AUSIMM Branch Conference in Nelson.
- Publicly distributed the TEXAS (Tenement EXploration and Administration System) high level specifications - a new electronic system for permit processing and accessing geo-technical data.
- Completed a business process re-engineering of permitting processes and reduced turnaround times to 11 weeks and cleared a backlog of 220 permits.
- Visited North America to seek exploration investment in New Zealand from petroleum companies.
Fourth Quarter
- Secured capital approval for development of "TEXAS".
- Announced the extension of the Northland blocks offer to coincide with blocks offers for two additional basins in 2005.
- Launched a web-enabled catalogue to electronically access over 80GB of geo-technical data.
- Granted the Pohokura mining permit, New Zealand's largest offshore project since the Maui B development in the late 1990's.
- Secured Executive Council approval of the replacement Minerals Programme for Petroleum.
The emergence of a dedicated investment promotion team has generated significant interest in New Zealand which promises much for 2005.
The policy team has developed into a strong advocate for the petroleum mineral wealth of New Zealand and made policy contributions on the high country tenure review, the Foreshore & Seabed Bill, the Aquaculture Reform Bill, the RMA review, and the Marine Reserves Bill. It concluded the year by delivering a new Petroleum Minerals Programme.
And the Exploration and Mining Services team has heavily invested in additional technical capability which has seen a noticeable increase in compliance activity across both the minerals and petroleum industries.
I would like to take this opportunity to thank the industry for its support of the changes and new direction being taken by Crown Minerals, and we wish everyone a very successful 2005.
