General Discussion AGY, page-16563

I flew back via Dubai yesterday on the top deck of an Emirates A380, where a fellow passenger’s carry-on was sporting a keyring with the word SALTA. Ended up chatting with a Regional Head of Rio Tinto. It was a brief, yet illuminating discussion with an absolute professional. He reiterated costs had tripled since first assessment, and that it was clearly difficult to get people to want to fly in and work there. He said there was no local workforce to speak of with required specialised skill sets for chemicals manufacturing, so FIFO wages would be a headache. When I said I had a stake in a local company there, he said in many ways a smaller, local outfit could potentially do better than a big foreign player such as Rio Tinto with the required overheads, bells and whistles that go along with being a top tier company. I came away with more respect for Rio Tinto, and more faith in AGY.
Oh, and most pax watched the soccer, and we all clapped at the end!