Chile’s state-owned Codelco, the world’s largest copper producer, agreed on Friday to start the process of closing its troubled Ventanas smelter, the company said.
Workers had threatened action, including a strike, if the board did not invest to upgrade the facility after an environmental incident sickened dozens of people.
The mining company stopped the smelter for maintenance and operational adjustments ordered by the environmental regulator after dozens of people fell ill in its saturated industrial location on the east coast.
The company would help workers secure jobs, offering options such as relocation, retraining, or special voluntary retirement plans to deal with the transition, it said.
Closing the smelter will require changes to a law that forces the company to smelt minerals from state-owned Enami, a company for small and medium-scale miners, exclusively at Ventanas.
This report’s information was first seen on Reuters; to read more, click this link.
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