Argentine: Tomorrow, a Great Mining Power

Once the world’s granary, soon a mining power? According to its president Javier Milei, the future of Argentina partly lies at 3,500 meters above sea level in the Andes, where the ambitious Los Azules project heralds a copper revolution.

The RIGI, an incentive regime for large investments adopted in 2024, has already attracted over 20 billion dollars of potential investments. Mining exports surged by 27% in 2025 and could triple by 2030.

But the boom is not without concerns: threatened glaciers, water management, past contamination – and the question posed by a local gas station attendant: “Either I protect the water, or I eat.”

By Tomás Viola (AFP) – Calingasta, Argentina

Aldana Ramirez, a 27-year-old mining technician, only sees her seven-year-old son every two weeks when she descends to 1,500 meters to Villa Calingasta, her village of 2,700 inhabitants. “But the sacrifice is worth it – I love this job! The first time I went up there, I fell in love,” she tells AFP while supervising the excavators drilling 24/7, creating a constant background noise.

Her job is at Los Azules, an exploration for a copper mine in the San Juan province (west, 1,400 km from Buenos Aires). A monumental project: kilometers of tracks for vehicles and trucks carved into the mountainside, amidst a backdrop of immense rocky landscape, glaciers, and snow banks. McEwen Copper (Canada) is investing nearly 3 billion dollars, in collaboration with Stellantis and Rio Tinto/Nuton, for a projected production of 148,000 tons per year after 2030.

“Mining revolution”

It is a flagship of the mining revolution, a mantra of Javier Milei, the president since late 2023: “Mining operations will extend throughout the Cordillera, generating hundreds of thousands of jobs,” he declared in March at the Parliament. The driving force behind this is RIGI, an incentive regime for large investments, implemented in 2024 to reward significant capital inflows from foreign investors with tax, customs, or exchange benefits for 30 years.

Currently, nearly 40 projects have been proposed, 16 approved, with over 20 billion dollars of potential investments. The majority in the mining sector, followed by hydrocarbons. In 2025, Argentina’s mining exports increased by 27% to reach 6 billion dollars, driven by gold and lithium, making it the fifth-largest global producer. According to the Central Bank’s projections, this total could triple by 2030 or even quintuple within a decade.

Michael Meding, the general manager of Los Azules, assures AFP that RIGI “has sent very important signals to international investors.” According to economist Nicolas Gadano, “Argentina’s export matrix is transforming” with the rise of the mining and hydrocarbon sectors, addressing the country’s chronic dollar shortages compared to its traditionally agricultural DNA.

“Argentina’s export matrix is transforming.” – Nicolas Gadano, economist.

Half of the projected mining exports are linked to copper, crucial for construction, energy transition, and AI development. Argentina has produced almost no copper since 2018 but has enough reserves to be among the top 10 globally – far behind Chile, the number one producer, as Milei cites as an example. In Calingasta, near the Chilean border, the impact on employment is real: many residents are directly or indirectly employed in mining activities.

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Territorial transformation

The mining boom raises environmental concerns. The final pit of Los Azules is estimated to cover the equivalent of 840 soccer fields and plunge over 300 meters deep – nearly the height of the Eiffel Tower. It may involve relocating a vega, an altitude oasis with spongy vegetation serving as a habitat for local fauna and a water regulator.

Although Los Azules promises to be carbon neutral by 2038 and claims an extraction method with minimal water usage, the long-term impact is questionable. Especially now that the Parliament has revised the so-called Glacier Law, granting more flexibility to provinces to approve mining projects.

“People must choose: either I protect the water, or I eat,” resigns Alejandro, a gas station attendant in Jachal Valley. The memory of the 2015 contamination of three local rivers due to a leak of a million liters of cyanide solution from a Barrick Gold mine is still fresh. While not opposed to mining activities, Alejandro believes “there are not enough controls” from the government.

“People must choose: either I protect the water, or I eat.” – Alejandro, gas station attendant in the Andean valley.

But high above Los Azules, where cumbia music helps forget the icy wind, 27-year-old drill operator Andres Carrizo mostly hopes “that all this will continue, that we all have jobs, and that we can develop.”

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