Bingman Catchment Landcare Group Incorporated
To support more informed decision-making, SGS assessed the local economic impacts of the proposed Bowdens silver mine near Mudgee, in the NSW Central Tablelands.
Commissioned by the Bingham Catchment Landcare Group, our work involved preparing economic impact scenarios for the region surrounding the proposed mine. It aimed to complement earlier analysis commissioned by Bowdens, which focused on broader state-level impacts on the community and economy rather than the specific effects on the local region.
To generate these insights, we:
- Profiled key sectors in the local economy, estimating their current size and how they are forecast to grow under a ‘no mine’ scenario.
- Defined potential ‘low’ and ‘high’ mine impact scenarios and how this would detract from future growth in key sectors, such as agriculture and tourism, before comparing the adverse local economic impacts of the ‘high’ and ‘low’ scenarios with the positive local economic impacts associated with the mine.
The low- and high-impact scenarios aimed to illustrate the eventuation of negative impacts on key sectors, stemming from the misalignment of mining with the region’s branding, through to major operational failures or natural disasters. SGS was not engaged to estimate the likelihood of any negative impacts; rather, the SGS report adopted a 'what if' scenario approach where the low impact scenario was assumed to cause a 10% reduction in the growth of value added generated by the agricultural and tourism sectors, whereas the high impact scenario was roughly double this.
We concluded that a positive net impact on the local economy from the mine is not guaranteed. Significant attention should be paid to the potential negative consequences on core sectors, as well as the broader ramifications of the mine for the diversity, viability and resilience of local businesses.
