Jean-Pierre Casas & REXMA: gold mining and sustainable development in Guyana

After obtaining a gold mining permit legally in 2012 in the municipality of Saül in Guiana, the REXMA company and its director, Jean-Pierre Casas, were targeted by ecological lobbies.

Jean-Pierre CASAS, mining entrepreneur, former director of REXMA

Despite the environmental guarantees provided by REXMA, the authorities who had issued the permit preferred to give in to environmentalist pressure. The Limonade Creek mining project had to be abandoned, entailing heavy losses for the company and a lack of earnings for the local economy. Widely reported by certain media and social networks with varying degrees of bias, this case illustrates the problem of economic development in Guyana, where SMEs in the mining sector are up against large international consortiums but also - and above all- radical environmentalists.

Recherche et Exploitation minière aurifère SAS (to give its full name), REXMA is an SME specialising in gold prospecting and extraction. It has been established in Guiana since 1998.

The Guyanese Eldorado

The South American continent is one of the most important gold mining basins (Guiana Plateau, south-east Amazonia, north of the Andes chain). Some 20% of the world's gold production is extracted from this Eldorado every year. Guiana has been a real gold rush since the 1990s and the significant rise in the price of the yellow metal. The gold industry has thus become the second largest industrial sector in French Guyana after the space industry. At the same time, the number of illegal mining sites has increased significantly. It is estimated that 8 to 10 tonnes of gold are mined illegally in Guiana every year by garimpeiros [gold miners] from Brazil and Suriname.

Guyana's gold potential is also coveted by large mining groups, particularly from North America. The state grants these multinationals exploration areas that can exceed 150 km².

Between illegal garimpeiros and multinationals, some fifty very small and medium-sized enterprises (VSEs and SMEs) mine legally around 2 tonnes of gold per year. The VSEs perpetuate a quasi-artisanal activity inherited from the first prospectors of the mid-19th century. SMEs such as REXMA work with mining permits that are subject to very strict specifications, particularly in terms of environmental requirements.

Fig.1: Limonade Creek

A mining permit issued by the French administration

On 1 August 2006, the Minister for the Economy, Industry and Employment, Mr Eric Besson, granted REXMA a Permis de Recherche Exclusive (PER) [exclusive prospecting permit] for an area of approximately 24 km² to the south of the municipality of Saül.

Crossed by the Limonade Creek, this area is located on the outskirts of the future Amazonian Park of Guiana, which was officially created in February 2007. (Fig.1)

The firm ECOBIOS was commissioned to conduct an environmental impact study prior to obtaining a Permis d’Exploitation Minière (PEX) [mining permit]. It should be noted that the person in charge of this study was a candidate for appointment to the Regional Scientific Council for Natural Heritage* in Guyana, which would be created in April 2007. This candidacy is obviously likely to generate a potential conflict of interest...

ECOBIOS did not submit its report by the contractually agreed date. An expert-biologist had to be commissioned to recover (not without difficulty) the reports drawn up by ECOBIOS in order to complete the ecological diagnosis requested by the Direction régionale de l’Industrie, de la Recherche et de l’Environnement (DRIRE) [Regional Directorate for Industry, Research and the Environment].

* Decree N°894/2D/2B/ENV of 30 April 2007 concerning the creation of the Regional Scientific Council for Natural Heritage

On 26 October 2012, Mr Arnaud Montebourg, Minister for industrial recovery, granted the company REXMA a mining permit (PEX), known as the "Limonade permit" for a period of 5 years. *

Covering approximately 10 km², the mining area is located in the Amazonian Park's free adherence area. Mining activities are permitted in this peripheral zone. (Fig.2) The Schéma départemental d'Orientation minière (SDOM) [Departmental Mining Orientation Plan] finally closed the area to mining. REXMA's PEX remained valid because it antedated said closure. To begin mining, REXMA still had to obtain an Autorisation d’Ouverture des Travaux Miniers (AOTM) [authorisation to open mining works] issued by the prefecture.

* Decree of 26/10/2012/ published in the journal officiel (JO) [Official Gazette] of 11/12/2021

The green hell is not what it seems…

Despite the environmental conservation guarantees provided, the REXMA project came under virulent criticism and bitter attacks by environmental lobbies.

The mining area is not located in the heart of the Amazonian Park of Guyana, but the mayor of Saül, who is also the president of the park, is now opposing the REXMA project by prohibiting mining within 10 km of the town. Anonymous letters and false allegations ensued, and Jean-Pierre Casas was (wrongly) suspected of having falsified the environmental impact study report in order to obtain a mining permit (see box).

The REXMA case has been reported by certain media and social networks with varying degrees of bias.

The case found resonance in metropolitan France and beyond. A French-Canadian astrophysicist turned environmental activist went as far as to send an open letter (16/01/2013) to the Minister for Industrial Recovery calling on him to oppose the mining permit that he himself had granted!

Fig. 2: Protected areas in Guiana and location of the "Limonade permit" - REXMA

On 23 August 2013, as a “precautionary measure”, Minister Montebourg invited the Prefect of Guyana not to authorise the launch of mining work by REXMA.

On 14 October 2015, the Prefect of Guiana issued an order rejecting REXMA's AOTM (authorisation to open mining works). The opening of the mining works was suspended...definitively!

Having already invested €2 million in its project, REXMA found itself in great difficulty, with capital committed to prospecting, the purchase of equipment and machinery (mechanical shovels, etc.), salaries to be paid, etc. This was the end of the story for this SME. Some 70 potential jobs were thus sacrificed*. Local economic development projects were cast into the murky waters of Limonade Creek.

* In 2019, the unemployment rate in Guyana was 20% (compared with 8% in metropolitan France). This rate was as high as 31% for those under 30. (Insee 2020)

There is no denying that ecology is a real and important issue.

The REXMA mining project has not been sacrificed in the name of ecology. It has been sacrificed on the altar of green clientelism. Some politicians capitulate to radical environmentalist dogmatism so as not to compromise their future.

It is far easier to turn a small mining company into a scapegoat than to solve the problem of illegal mining and its dramatic environmental consequences or to oppose powerful multinationals.

In 2015, the French SME REXMA was forced to abandon an eco-responsible mining project...

That same year, Emmanuel Macron, then Minister for Economic Affairs, supported the project for a gigantic open-pit gold mine*, in the middle of the Guiana forest, by the Russian-Canadian consortium Montagne d'Or. The future president declared to the newspaper Les Echos: “[This project] is fully involved in the mining revival of France. "... (August 2015)

* approximately 400 m deep, 3 km long and 1 km wide

REXMA: an innovative and eco-responsible mining project

REXMA's objective was to make the "Limonade" mining area an innovative pilot site for gold mining in French Guiana. (Fig.3) Alluvial gold mining, which involves extracting gold from creeks, rivers and streams, is generally considered the most environmentally friendly extraction method due to the reduced environmental impact compared to underground mining.

Physical - and therefore non-polluting - methods such as screening and gravimetric separation are used to separate the gold from the mineral fraction. REXMA had also decided to ban the use of water in the mining process (lance monitor), a technique that damages the aquatic environment.

Optimal water management should ensure that the ecosystems downstream of the operation are not disturbed.

The implementation of these mining processes was a first in Guyana. REXMA hoped to demonstrate that it was possible to mine alluvial deposits in a responsible and sustainable manner.

Fig.3: The REXMA observation site in Saül, 2010.

Thanks to the ore recovery technology developed specifically for this operation, the gold recovery yield was expected to reach 80% to 90% of the resource present. As most of the ore would have been extracted from the deposit, it would not be clandestinely reclaimed by the garimpeiros*.

* Following the abandonment of the REXMA project, the area was finally illegally exploited by clandestine miners...

A mining site rehabilitated by REXMA

At the end of the 5 years of authorised mining, REXMA had planned to rehabilitate the site so as to restore it as close to its initial state as possible by dismantling the installations, remodelling the land, rearranging the creek bed, regreening the deforested and cleared areas, etc. (Fig.4)

Fig.4 Regreening of the Verdun Creek previously exploited by REXMA

REXMA was to invest a total of €4,700,000 for 5 years of mining followed by 2 years of post-rehabilitation monitoring, thereby contributing to the local economy. In addition to the site rehabilitation works, REXMA also proposed to implement projects for local development and the improvement of the living environment: construction of an observation museum dedicated to traditional gold panning in Guiana, assistance to an environmental protection association, maintenance of the banks of the Limonade Creek, installation of a fishing pontoon, treatment of an illegal and polluting rubbish dump on the outskirts of Saül and Limonade Creek, etc. (Fig.5)

Fig. 5: Illegal dump on the outskirts of Saül (present before the arrival of REXMA). The waste includes cans of products that are toxic to the environment and aquatic organisms. REXMA offered to make its construction machinery available to deal with this illegal waste dump.

The REXMA case in Guyana: A mining SME in a green hell