More than 8 billion pesos received several communes in the O’Higgins region, benefiting from the first transfer of resources from the new Mining Royalty Law, which will be distributed proportionally through the Municipal Common Fund and cannot be allocated to pay debts and hire staff.
This law came into force last January, after several years of processing and will raise 1.35 billion dollars annually from 2025, which is why a mechanism known as bridge funds was created, which will allow municipalities to advance the half of the money that will begin to be transferred from next year.
Of the total collection under the regime, 450 million dollars will be allocated to enhance the development of the region. Half of these resources will be delivered to all regional governments through the Fund for Productivity and Development and the other half, to 90 percent of the country’s municipalities, through the Territorial Equity Fund, to be distributed among the communes with greater dependence on the Municipal Common Fund; and the Mining Communes Fund, for those who live directly from the externalities of mining activity.
The resources that will be delivered to the municipalities will be freely available, which will be able to invest them according to the needs of each of those territories, in the areas of improving public services, construction of social works for the population, which will have constant control of its allocation and use.
In this way, investment, development and a better quality of life are being promoted for families in several communities in the region.
This act of the first transfer of resources from the Mining Royalty Law was carried out at the Codelco Integrated Operations Center in Rancagua, and was attended by the presidential delegate, Fabio López Aguilera; Germán Sandoval, manager of Codelco El Teniente Division; the senator and president of the Senate Mining and Energy Commission, Juan Luis Castro; deputy Marcela Riquelme; government minister, Carlos Carrasco; Seremi of Mining, Bárbara Gavia; Subdere O’Higgins, Pamela Caro; among other personalities.
“The future of mining must also be the future of the communities and I believe that the step that the country is taking today with the implementation of the Royalty Law, gives us one more step in that future, where the mining is actively and permanently integrated with the communities that surround us,” said Codelco’s Sustainability and External Affairs Manager, Germán Sandoval, at the start of the protocol act.
Addressing the public, representing the mayors of the region who benefited from this law, the mayor of Doñihue, Paula Ponce, said that precisely on this day she received the quota of almost 600 million pesos, of which almost 180 million the Territorial Equity Fund and 411 million, for having been incorporated as a “mining commune.”
“It was an arduous fight, a long fight and a fight full of hope,” said Ponce while thanking the wishes and dialogues for being heard.
He called on his fellow mayors, “it is to be able to put these resources in a transparent way and for the community to know that they will be used for their benefit and for us to be able to make transparent what we want to do with those resources.”
Senator Juan Luis Castro, when speaking, said bluntly that “this was a political agreement” and that this cost a lot because there had been parliamentary initiatives for many years in Congress.
He also said that creating three funds: Regional Fund for Productive Development, Territorial Equity Fund and the Mining Participation Fund, “is a joint achievement of parliamentarians, Municipal Councils and various political sectors, because this was a dream that had to be arrive”. Castro believes that this is a milestone, which places it in the status of being a great political advance for the country.
For her part, representative Marcela Riquelme considers it very relevant that “we have this remuneration today as a region, there are only 6 regions in Chile that receive the Mining Communes Fund.”
“We are a third of state production, but we financially represent more than half of what Codelco receives, it is from this region,” added the parliamentarian.
Riquelme invited the mayors to think about “how we want our region from copper; Let’s think about how we want our communes and our country.”
For the presidential delegate, Fabio López, this is a clear example of the decentralizing spirit that the government of President Gabriel Boric has, emphasizing that “this is a vote of confidence that is delivered to all the municipalities of the country.”
López insisted that the trust that must be placed in public institutions must be vindicated, and the delivery of these resources is also a vote of confidence. At the same time, and taking the words of Senator Castro, he said that this is part of a political agreement and in this way “claim the value of politics in Chile, because thanks to politics, we have a Chile that is on the path to development…”.
He invited the mayors to use these resources well, since it is clear the destination they should have, since they are not for debts or personnel expenses, the only requirement being to spend them with transparency and in order to give greater progress to our communes.
#communes #OHiggins #receive #resources #Mining #Royalty
