Arizona is ranked 29th out of 93 mining regions in the world in combined policy and mineral potential, down from 25th out of 72 jurisdictions ranked last year in the Fraser Institute Annual Survey of Mining Companies 2011/2012. Wyoming and Nevada are the only two U.S. states in the top ten. Utah dropped out of the top ten and is now three notches below Arizona.
Since 1997, the Fraser Institute has conducted an annual survey of metal mining and explora tion companies to assess how mineral endowments and public policy factors such as taxation and regulation affect exploration investment. Survey results represent the opinions of executives and exploration managers in mining and mining consulting companies operating around the world. The survey now includes data on 93 jurisdictions around the world, on every continent except Antarctica, including subnational jurisdictions in Canada, Australia, the United States, and Argentina.
Arizona ranked highly in some of the roughly two dozen topical areas evaluated: 4th in the world in Infrastructure (includes access to roads, power availability, etc); 7th in Socio-economic agreements/community development conditions; 6th in Labor regulations, employment agreements, and labour militancy or work disruptions; 7th in Supply of labor/skills; 8th in Corruption (ie, whether corruption is a detriment to mining investment);
Arizona is the top-ranked U.S. state in Geological database (includes quality and scale of maps, ease of access to information, etc.) but 17th worldwide.
There are numerous other topics covered in this 131-page report.
Mining appears to be losing public support in mineral rich Arizona. Although the historic and top rated Arizona Mining and Mineral Museum was right in the midst of the recent state centennial celebration(Phoenix Best Fest), it was not even open for that event.
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