Mining Latin American opportunities

WESTERN Australian mining services companies, consulting firm COSOL, engineer GRD Minproc and testing equipment producer Essa among them, are taking advantage of the booming mining and resources market in Latin America.

It has even been suggested that mining opportunities in the resource-rich region far outweigh those available in WA.

Fremantle-based COSOL is the latest WA company to move into the South American market, through a strategic partnership with Brisbane-based Oniqua.

COSOL provides technology based services for the mining industry, while Oniqua offers analytic solutions for asset-intensive industries, including mining, oil & gas and utilities.

COSOL's director Latin American operations, Mark Cooper, said the Latin American mining and resources markets had been flying under the radar as WA's iron ore resources received most of the attention.

"Latin America has been somewhat hidden from our view with China's hunger for iron ore the focus," Mr Cooper told WA Business News.

"But WA's boom is being mirrored in Latin America.

"Chile is going through a similar boom to WA, it's really quite amazing. Chile's copper market has experienced a similar explosion to WA's iron ore market.

"And if you combine Peru, which has some incredible-sized projects, and Chile, it equates to the size of WA's boom."

COSOL laid the groundwork for its move last year.

"We created a 'limitada', similar to a pty ltd in Australia, to kick us off properly in the Latin American market," Mr Cooper said.

"And it was no easy feat. Being a WA company, we had to prepare ownership information, confirm identifications and really jump through hoops."

GRD's engineering subsidiary, GRD Minproc, has been in Latin America since the late 1980s.

GRD Minproc director development Tom Revy believes activity in the region will continue to grow despite any falls in commodity prices.

"Latin America is very hard to ignore with around a third of the world's exploration dollars being spent in the region," Mr Revy said.

Mr Revy, who is also director of the Australia-Latin America Business Council, said the size of the Latin American market was significant.

"Sincerely, it's extremely large, with lots of opportunities currently being discovered or developed across all types of commodities," he said.

"And relative to WA, which is very well explored, there are always new markets opening up in Latin America, such as Columbia and Ecuador.

"It's huge and not as many Australian companies are recognising it as they should. It will prove lucrative for those that get in first; as they say, first in best dressed."

GRD Minproc and COSOL aren't the only WA companies wanting a bigger slice of the Latin American pie.

Essa Group chief executive Darryl Stevens said establishing its operation in Brazil in late 2007 was a tough ordeal.

"It took us about 10 months to get in, which I've been told is quite good as it normally takes around two years," Mr Stevens said.

Essa, with offices in Bassendean and Belmont, supplies highly specialised equipment for the mining industry and is the primary supplier of sampling components for iron ore in the Pilbara.

"We had an obvious interest in entering the Brazilian market, as Vale, based in Belo Horizonte, is the world's leading producer of iron ore," Mr Stevens said.

"And Vale told us we needed to be in Brazil if we wanted to get a look in. In reality, it's on the other side of the world so you need to have people and product on the ground because fly-in, fly-out is not the answer."

Mr Stevens is confident about the future of Essa in the region.

"Latin America is a very big and very interesting market, and it's completely different to Australia," he said.

"Vale has lagged in quality control when compared to the Pilbara, but they are now ramping up quality control which means manufacturing will grow, leading to increased sales.

"Brazil is the future and we expect large amounts of sales but it depends on commodity prices and acceptance of our product, which we feel is a given."