But the minister clarified this by saying the government recognised all sectors within the resources industry were not experiencing the same economic growth – pointing to the current conditions faced by nickel explorers and producers.
 
“WA currently has known reserves and resources of 37 million tonnes of contained nickel. Of this 12 million tonnes of is in the nickel sulphide category and the rest is in the laterite category, regrettably most of which are not currently economic,” Moore said.
 
“WA nickel exploration expenditure in the 2011 calendar year increased by $A16 million, from $236 million in 2010 to $252 million in 2011.
 
“But if you look at the financial year 2011/12, compared to 2010/11, there was a decrease of about 1.6% in exploration expenditure.”
 
Moore said that given the current economic climate and with nickel process being depressed, exploration expenditure was likely to “drop more significantly in the year ahead”
 
“However, we have had a major achievement in respect to exploration in the nickel sector and that is the recent discovery in July 2012 of nickel-copper mineralisation at the Nova prospect in the Fraser Range by Sirius Resources.
 
“This, the company claims, signals the discovery of a new nickel-copper province … a discovery of some great significance I think.”
 
Although there had been some bright spots on the exploration front, including near mine extensions to mineralisation for a number of established producers, Moore said it was hard to ignore the bad news – the nickel price.
 
“The current price slump has reached levels not seen since mid-2009 in the midst of the GFC.
 
“This is cause for concern and if the trend continues we may see other mines closing. Since the beginning of 2011, the price of nickel has dropped dramatically from around $A27,000 per tonne to around $16,700 per tonne.
 
“That is a price that causes much pain for many producers and as a result of this we have seen BHP Billiton reduce staff by about 155 at its Nickel West operations.
 
“It would be naïve and unrealistic to expect this sector to be immune from the key markets that rely on this commodity.”