Admittedly, it’s been way too long since I last posted, just busy in general, and I’ve been devoting my little spare online time to my other portal, the one I want to turn into a “think tank” of sorts way down in the future.
Anyhow, there is a news item I wanted to share with you:
It seems that some miner’s syndicates in Potosí have asked for an official review of Apex Silver’s hiring and staffing practices for the San Cristobal project, alleging that almost 40 percent of the current labor force is composed of foreigners (expatriates). The ministry of Mining and Metallurgy, Dionisio Garzón [profile link here, ES] has agreed to begin the official inquiry for this and the Kori Chaca gold project.
According to ERBOL’s press report, current regulations allows for only up to 15 percent foreign-born employee quota. With the additional requisite that such employees have specializations inexistent in Bolivia.
Now, if you ask me, 15 percent is a decent quota for foreign personnel, especially in mining. But when it comes to new and rather large projects such as San Cristobal I’d settle for a Saudi style policy, where foreign personnel numbers can start on over 35 percent of the labor force but are decreased at a constant rate (5 percent per year in this case) as the project progresses. This policy allows for training of the domestic staff to take place and creates managerial talent among local hires. As far as San Cristobal is concerned, I’ll try to find official figures to publish.
On the political realm, we’re just a few weeks away from election, and for your reading enjoyment, you may want to check out the different “Programs” the parties have presented, Miguel Centellas’ comments on why Evo Morales won't debate Tuto Quiroga, and finally a sample of “dirty war” –style TV spots (unfortunately only available at a site owned by some folks I don’t like too much), now that I think about it they pale in comparison to some of the stuff that floated around during the Bush/Kerry presidential race.
Tags: Bolivia
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2 comments:
I can't get the video to work anymore. You know the first video was a controversial one. Apparently the textile worker is really a driver in the PODEMOS camp.
And the "President of MyPes Federation" in the MAS ad was a fake one too. They since have removed both videos. The PODEMOS defense was that the the driver used to work in textiles, kind of weak but still better than MAS response... I'd love to get a hold of the newer videos, but well see about that.
Try this:
http://www.perez-inc.com/proselitismo/proselitismo.wmv
bye
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