Granite mining suspended

Granite extraction has been suspended in mines at Parbatipur upazila of Dinajpur for an indefinite period since around 6:00am on Saturday for a lack of explosives.

Maddhapara Granite Mining Company, under state-owned Petrobangla which manages the country's oil, gas and mineral resources, engaged Germania Trest Consortium (GTC) in a contract to develop and maintain its mines.

Tap here to add The Daily Star as a trusted source

Under the contract, the Maddhapara company is supposed to supply the GTC with ammonium nitrate, an industrial chemical commonly used as an explosive for quarrying and mining activities.

A senior official of the Maddhapara company, seeking anonymity, confirmed as much, saying that they had stopped supplying the GTC with the explosives required.

According to different sources, this is the third time the GTC has had to suspend operations since 2015 for the Maddhapara company's failure to supply required logistics or other equipment on time.

The GTC first halted its mining activities in 2015 and the stalemate continued until the end of 2017, when the required machinery and materials were finally brought in from abroad.

The recent suspension is expected to somewhat affect the government's ongoing development projects as well as those in the private sector due to the persisting scarcity of granite in the country.

Though sales of existing stocks will continue, only boulders are available among the six sizes of granite usually sold.

Granite is used in buildings, bridges, pavements and monuments while its polished slabs and tiles are used in countertops, tiles, stair treads and many other design elements expressing elegance and quality.

Officials of the Maddhapara company said the situation had stemmed from a global supply shortage of explosives and so mining activities would resume as soon as possible.

A general manager of the company said they have been working to procure explosives for the last six months but have so far failed for various reasons.

For example, a tender was floated thrice in the last six months but they did not receive any response from potential bidders.

Company authorities even officially contacted different explosive manufacturing companies in countries like India and Thailand.

And although Thailand eventually agreed to supply explosives, they are charging double the previous rate, he added.

The Maddhapara company requires about Tk 5 to Tk 6 crore worth of explosives annually.

"A shipment of explosives is supposed to arrive at the Chattogram port any day after March 21," said Abul Taleb Farazi, a general manager of the Maddhapara company.

"We are quite hopeful about resuming our activities within a couple of weeks," he added.

Granite and other rock extracted by the Maddhapara company have high demand among local construction companies as they are of a higher quality yet cheaper than the materials that could be imported from countries like India and Bhutan.

The Maddhapara company extracts around 1 million tonnes of rock each year from three mines against an annual production target of 1.65 million tonnes, which could not be achieved since the company began operations in May 2007.

The extracted materials are sold to construction companies through 93 appointed dealers.