MINTABIE /TUCSON / HONG KONG /SHOW GUIDE
MINTABIE
A recent meeting was held by various government departments on the opal field in Mintabie. They were escorted in by 6 police vehicles. Currently the dead line to leave has been extended to 1 July 2019 after which fines can apply. It seems that while the residential town will close, mining can still take place, but currently there are no plans to allow miners to stay on the field. Most miners have said this is impracticable as they would have to travel long distances and leave valuable equipment un- attended. Currently there has been a surge in break ins in town. There is to be another meeting to discuss the options available but so far there is no talk of any compensation to business owners or miners
Details of the meeting were as follows
Residents will be fast tracked for center links payments.
Residents will be fast tracked for trust housing in another town.
Free mental health support.
The mines dept could not answer most questions from the miners.
Police spoke about the local aborigines getting drugs from Mintabie as the main reason to close the town.
The town does have a $750 000 fighting fund from a insurance payout of the hall that burnt down and have engaged a solicitor to look after their interests.
It appears that there are many un -answered questions in regards to mining activity, we will keep you informed of any progress
TUCSON SHOW GUIDE
We are asking members who would like to participate in an add in the Tucson show guide for 2019. Results from the survey for last year’s add suggested we do only one page and some members also would like to mention that opal production is up on most Australian opal fields. Please reply asap and if some one would like to do the art work let me know!
HONG KONG SHOW
The cyclone caused the first show to loose a day and the jewelery show lost 2 days. Some reports suggest traffic was well down from previous years and its not clear if the weather was the main cause.The organizers say it was the best attendance on records for both shows so that sounds a bit confusing! They quote both shows as having 87000 buyers and 4550 sellers so each seller averaged 19 buyers/lookers! Should we be doing a group add for Opals in Hong Kong??
FACETS SHOW COLOMBO
I recently attended the facets show in Sri Lanka which is known for its blue sapphires and I was surprised at the number of Chinese buyers present. While business is down it was a very successful show. It did make me wonder why our opal shows get very few Chinese buyers while this show was well attended. There are many Chinese construction workers there who moon light and act as the front men for local gem merchants to sell to Chinese. It made me wonder what are we doing wrong!!
Kind Regards
Paul Sedawie
President of the Opal Association