MINING SECTOR

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER (14:59): Will the Minister for Mineral Resources Development provide the chamber with an update on grants in the mining sector?

The Hon. P. HOLLOWAY (Minister for Police, Minister for Mineral Resources Development, Minister for Urban Development and Planning) (14:59): I thank the honourable member for his very concise but appropriate question. Mineral exploration in South Australia has never been so strong. Thanks to the successful plan for accelerating exploration or PACE initiative, it will continue to drive this important sector even further.

Recently I had the pleasure of announcing the highly-anticipated fifth round of funding under the PACE program. PACE drilling grants of $2.3 million have been awarded to 29 mineral, petroleum and geothermal exploration projects. The successful PACE projects were selected from 66 high-calibre applications by an expert panel, including independent geological consultants. In addition to the PACE grants the industry is expected to spend a further $6 million on exploration on these projects, bringing the total additional mineral exploration expenditure, just on these projects, to an estimated $8.4 million.

The 29 successful proposals comprised 26 mineral projects and three geothermal/petroleum projects in South Australia. Of the approved projects, 14 are within the Gawler Craton, three each within the Curnamona province, the Musgrave province and the Adelaide Geosyncline, two in the Eromanga Basin and one in each of the Arkaringa, Eucla and Lake Eyre Basins.

The latest round of proposals includes new targets in frontier areas, new exploration ideas and interest in a wide range of commodities. The variety of these projects is very encouraging and clearly demonstrates the success of the PACE initiative in generating worldwide interest in prospectivity within South Australia. Many of these projects may not have been realised without the assistance of PACE. Significant discoveries which have previously been made with vital PACE contributions include the RMG Services/Teck Cominco's Carrapateena prospect, Quasar/Alliance Resources' 4 Mile project, Lynch Mining's Bramfield, Malache and Oakdale prospects and Iluka Resources Gulliver's and Dromedary Heavy Mineral Sand's prospects.

Under the PACE program the state government will co-fund up to 50 per cent of approved drilling projects to enhance the level of mineral exploration in the state. As well as encouraging exploration, PACE has had a very successful multiplier effect on investment dollars in South Australia and, of course, that has helped us reach the 12-month total exploration expenditure of $296.9 million to September 2007, compared with a paltry $30 million when this government took office some years ago. So, the latest round of PACE funding is a further example of the Rann government's continued commitment to ensuring future minerals and energy discoveries within the state.