A Comparative and Analytical Assessment of Contractors' Problems in Iran's Large Mines with a Special Focus on Copper Mines

Having rich mineral reservoirs, Iran has great potentials for developing this field, especially in copper mines. Mining in Iran has great potentials for helping economy and creating jobs. Studying and solving the problems of contractors and making necessary preparations for them in order to enter the mining industry and making investment in this area are of effective factors in actualizing the vast mining potentials in Iran. Existence of large-scale contractors in mining operations is considered not only an inseparable arm of the domestic large-scale mining body, but is also looked upon as the prerequisite for sustainable economic development. In any way, despite the undeniable benefits and necessity of large-scale mining contractors for working in large-scale mines, some strategic problems such as international sanctions, lack of access to quality mining machineries, lack of access to quality spare parts and up-to-date technologies, worn-out transportation, time-consuming process of finding spare parts due to sanction conditions, currency rate fluctuations, changes in stated inflation trend, etc., result in limiting contractors’ activities in the large scale. In this research, in addition to studying the major problems of contractors in large mines of Iran, the most important challenges of large-scale mining contractors, especially in large copper mines are reviewed and support solutions such as making preparations for importing up-to-date and large machineries and spare parts, adaptation of adjustment to inflation rate, making specific price list for mining industry, etc. for the continuity of mining contractors’ operations are presented.