Please HELP to Save Teghut Forest
The Armenian Copper Programme, a privately owned company, plans to build a massive open-pit copper mine in the small town of Teghut, Armenia. The mine is positioned to level over 1,500 acres of forest, reducing biodiversity and damaging local ecosystems.
Armenia has already lost most of its forests. Only about eight percent of the country is forested, down from a peak of more than 40 percent, and former forests are turning to desert. At the current rate, the country could become completely deforested by 2030.
In the Teghut region, at least 19 plant species, 21 mammals and 11 fish species, including the caucasian persimmon, the caucasian gray bear, and several types of eagle are already listed as endangered or threatened. The mine will degrade what little habitat remains for these species.
The exploitation of the Teghut mine will have an immense negative effect on nature, life and health of the people. Exploitation of the Teghut mine means:
- the mine will be exploited as an open pit, which means, up to 500 million cubic meters of waste rock and tailings will be generated, destroying thousands of hectares of forests, pastures and orchards, destroying the water regime of the region, polluting the streams and the rivers, burying local streams under waste rock and releasing hundreds of tons a year of dust particles into the air.
- Construction of a tailings dump with a volume of about 175 million cubic meters, which will be the largest for Armenia and will have an immediate effect on Debed river, which is already polluted heavily with metals and chemical reagents.
- No opportunities for agricultural development, which means disappearance of hundreds of traditional, environmentally clean jobs, and replacement of these jobs with low-paid, mine laborer jobs in a hazardous and toxic environment.
The Armenian Copper Program (ACP) company, which is going to exploit the mine at Teghut, is registered in Lichtenstein, and is part of the "Vallex Group". The Russian Bank VTB is Planning to fund the disastrous project of mine exploitation in Teghut.
We the undersigned protest against
Government of Armenia, "Vallex Group" and
VTB Bank.
Stop destroy the Teghut Forest!
