Since 2018, when Zijin Copper Serbia took over the former RTB Bor, the company has invested 197 million dollars in environmental protection, 230 hectares of areas that were degraded by mining have been greened, and 228,500 seedlings have been planted,” he said at the annual conference and the company’s deputy general manager Zou Gang, Beta reported.
He said that the final works on the reconstruction of metallurgical aggregates are in progress at the copper smelter, and apart from the fact that this will affect the increase in production, emphasis is also placed on the decades-long problem of air pollution “which will now be a thing of the past”, said Gang, who in the company in charge of ecology and environmental protection.
He added that waste water treatment plants have been built, which are returned to production and thus protect the waterways.
In support of this, he stated that the analysis of water quality parameters in the Bor river in 2022 compared to 2018 revealed a reduced content of lead by 99.99 percent, copper by 93 percent, iron by 93.6, while the average pH value in 2022. was 7.27 (neutral), compared to the average pH value from 2018, when it was 4.86 (highly acidic).
In order to monitor the quality of watercourses, timely response and river preservation, he stated that the company installed online monitoring stations on the Borska River and the Pek River near Majdanpek, the results of which show an improvement in water quality.
Gang pointed out that the most time and money was invested in the greening of the flotation tailings pond.
“By creating green areas on an area of 60 hectares and dams 1, 2 and 3, the village of Oštrelj received a ‘shield’ from dust. This solved the long-standing concern of the residents of this village, and the measuring stations showed that the concentration of PM particles is far below the permitted values,” he said.
He reiterated that the company, in order to rehabilitate the “Visoki Planiri” landfill site of Kopovo, which was created several decades ago, took upon itself the organization and preparation of the terrain for greening, so that the symbol of the city of Bor, which is under the jurisdiction of the Government of Serbia and the Institute for mining metallurgy, got a new look.
The director of the human resources sector, Huang Zhaoi, reminded that in December 2018, after the arrival of Zijin Copper in Bor, the number of employees in the company was 4,973, while on January 31 of this year it was 6,136, of which 97 percent were local residents, and if if the number of employees in cooperative companies is counted, that number is 9,200.
“The average net salary of employees in 2018 was about 68,000 dinars, and in 2022 it will be almost 111,000 dinars,” Dzaoi said.
The chief engineer of Zijin Copper, Benjamin Jiao, referred to the current situation when it comes to the relocation of the village of Veliki Krivelj due to mining, and stated that intensive meetings with representatives of the Ministry of Mining and Energy have recently been held due to this topic, and that there was to great progress.
“We will build a new settlement, which means new roads, new schools and other facilities according to the highest standards.” For the construction of the settlement, we will listen to the opinions of the public and we are already in conversation with the residents of Veliki Krivelje. Our goal is to live together with the local community and achieve good results together and in the whole situation we all come out as winners,” said Jiao.
He said that the exact date will be determined only when Zijin and the government determine the spatial plan, but he also hopes that it will be as soon as possible.
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