The presence of mining companies like Crystallex and Hecla is a highly controversial issue among many NGOs and indigenous groups in Venezuela. The main reason for the controversy over their activities is the fact that the mining takes place in the Imataca Forest, a large forest reserve along the border with disputed Guyana. Though it doesn’t have the status of a national park, the area is under special administration. The Imataca forest reserve, which is bordered by the Orinoco delta in the north and the area of Las Claritas in the south, was created in 1963 and measures 3.8 million (!!!) hectares of land, which makes it roughly as big as The Netherlands. The area is rich in different wood arts, gold, diamonds, copper, bauxite, magnesium, water, genetic diversity, and energy.

Because the Imataca Forest has the status of a reserve since 1963, it was supposed to have a Management Plan since then, but until 1997, such a plan never existed. This means that all logging and mining before that year was carried out on the basis of improvisation.

Although already in the eighties some twelve mining concessions were issued by the Venezuelan government in the Imataca Forest, there wasn’t much activity until recently, because of lack of infrastructure in the region. Logging companies preferred to focus on forests in the southwest of Venezuela. Since these forests have almost completely disappeared by now, logging companies started to focus more on Imataca, especially on the northern and eastern regions, for instance around Bochinche.

According to estimates, the Imataca Forest holds wood in store worth more than $6 billion. The value of the gold reserves in Imataca is even larger. The mines of Las Brisas and Las Cristinas, in the south of Imataca, are estimated to have roughly 21 million ounces of gold in store. Only the extraction of the gold in just these two mines would value more than $8 billion, depending on gold prices. The Imataca region probably holds the largest gold ore reserves in the whole of Latin America.