CEO of Saudi Ma'aden: we have about 2 trillion dollars worth of mineral resources in the Earth.. And gold reserves of up to 20 million ounces

Beth agency:
The CEO of Saudi Ma'aden, Bob Wilt, said; We aspire to be the mining sector is the third pillar of the industrial economy in Saudi Arabia, and we have about 2 trillion dollars worth of mineral resources in the Earth currently, and we are considered one of the largest exporters of phosphate fertilizers in the world, and we have a gold reserve of up to 20 million ounces.

Bob wilt stressed that the company aspires to be the minerals and mining the third pillar of the Saudi industrial economy, as the kingdom has huge resources of oil and gas and to some extent the company delayed exploration and development of the sector until we became in need of it".

He continued in an interview with Al Arabiya TV: "about 5-7 years ago, the government in Saudi Arabia realized the need for an integrated exploration program to help accelerate the downstream development process in the Kingdom, and we may have about 2 trillion dollars worth of mineral resources in the land currently, some of which are known as phosphate, and currently we are one of the largest exporters and producers of phosphate fertilizers in the world, bauxite, which is converted to aluminum, and there is a full value chain where we serve manufacturers of food and beverage cans as well as cars.

"We have a large gold business, and we already have a large base of operations to build on, but now we are starting the largest mineral exploration program, in any region in the world at the moment, and we have already achieved great success, we found a huge stock last year towards the end of the year with between 10 and 20 million ounces of gold, and there are more in the future, so we are excited to be able to take advantage of the kingdom's natural resources in a strong dynamic mining sector that will provide up to 50 thousand jobs,"he added.
On how Saudi Arabia compares to other countries in the world, Wilt said that the kingdom has done a great job in revising its mining law and simplifying regulations to the point where it is now bringing partners, and it is bringing other mining companies to help us and they are surprised that they can get mining licenses in the kingdom within 180 days,"he said.

"I am an American and it takes about 18 years to get a license in America, so you see the pace of change and rapid development in this sector,"said Wilt.

He pointed out that when Ma'aden started the phosphate project in 2002, it turned to the American Mosaic Company, a huge company for the production of phosphate fertilizers, to enter into a partnership with "Ma'aden".

Referring to cooperation with foreign companies in the mining ecosystem in the kingdom, he said," when we started in aluminum, we asked Alcoa to help provide technical support and financial resources to start this work.now, after the sponsored exploration program, we have contracted Ivanhoe Electric, an American copper exploration company, to help us explore the kingdom, as well as Barrick Gold, a Canadian company.

"We have partners and exploration operations working in cooperation with the government to attract foreign exploration and mining companies to join this great effort, which is evident in January every year at the minerals Future Forum in Riyadh, and the previous session witnessed more than 16,000 participants, and I can assure that all large and small mining companies and exploration companies were very interested in what the kingdom could offer,"he added.

"Our vision for Ma'aden is to be a globally relevant Saudi company with technological capability and a focus on people, so if young people are interested in global exposure to technology and being part of the future, we have jobs for them, and perhaps we need to double the size of our workforce 3 times in the next decade to meet our growth needs, and with this comes a lot of training and development,"he said.