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TORONTO (miningweekly.com) - After rising for six straight years, the world exploration budget for precious and base metals, diamonds, uranium and some industrial minerals may have dropped about 40% this year, according to early results from a study by Canada's Metals Economics Group (MEG).
The final figures will appear in the completed study, to be released in late October 2009.
However, preliminary estimates from the group's Corporate Exploration Strategies study suggest that 2009 exploration budgets will reach around $8,4-billion, compared with a global budget of $14-billion last year.
"Not surprisingly, with such a substantial drop, allocations for all commodities, at all stages, in all regions are down," MEG said in a statement.
Junior mining companies cut their exploration budgets the most, although most intermediate and major players have made deep reductions of their own in their 2009 exploration plans.
Still, "despite the juniors' contribution to the overall decline, the attrition rate within the junior ranks never reached the significant level predicted by some analysts earlier in the year," MEG commented.
The annual Corporate Exploration Strategies study is based on information collected from more than 2 800 mining and exploration companies, of which almost 2 000 had exploration budgets in 2009 and will be included in the final study.
