Develop said the memorandum of understanding with Tjiwarl Contracting Services was aimed at securing a range of commercial joint ventures and delivering long-term benefits to the Tjiwarl community.
Tjiwarl representative Kado Muir said the partnership represented a significant shift for business opportunities on Tjiwarl Country “away from transactional interactions towards genuine equity relationships in resources projects”.
Mr Beament said the joint venture framework had the potential to generate “vast economic benefits” for the TCS community.
“But more importantly, it is structured in a way which will provide members with life-long business skills, commercial relationships and ownership of a substantial asset base,” he said.
“This approach is aimed at helping to ensure that members have the skills, knowledge, experience and funding to self-determine their futures. That’s why the agreement allows for Develop’s interests in the joint venture to be transferred to TCS for no sale price at the appropriate time.”
The agreement includes TCS assuming full ownership once the business is operational, which would also give it greater access to Develop’s supply chain and contracts.
Develop will lend its underground mining and contracting expertise to assist TCS in setting up, funding and operating businesses which would provide contracting services to mines on Tjiwarl-determined land and in other areas.
Tjiwarl Country covers more than 13,000sqkm of land and waters situated roughly between Leinster and Wiluna, in WA’s Northern Goldfields region.
Joint contracting opportunities could include run-of-mine pad management at Bellevue Gold’s WA project, where Develop is already the underground mining contractor for, and light vehicle servicing at the mine.
The companies said other potential contracting opportunities include providing regional freight services between Kalgoorlie and the Bellevue project, providing labour to Develop’s subsidiary Premium Mining Personnel, and personal protection equipment and worker transport.
“Develop and TCS estimate that these contracts and other opportunities they have identified have a potential combined value of $50m over three years,” the companies said in a joint statement.
The collaboration is supported by Caterpillar dealer WesTrac, which will make its latest diesel-electric loaders available to the companies to support their decarbonisation efforts.
WesTrac chief executive Jarvas Croome said the loaders were focused on achieving a range of improvements in productivity, efficiency and sustainability.
“Among the benefits, the diesel-electric combination offers greater than 31 per cent improvement in fuel efficiency, alongside reduced maintenance costs and greater productivity compared to earlier models,” Mr Croome said.
WesTrac, one of the biggest CAT dealers globally by sales, is owned by Seven Group. SGH is a majority shareholder of Seven West Media, publisher of The West Australian.
