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developments. In a February 2017 blog post, Vancouver- based McCarthy Tetrault called Garcia vs. Tahoe "signi•- cant for both Canadian resource companies operating abroad and for foreign individuals alleging that Canadian parent companies are responsible for wrongs committed in the complainants' home country." Good as gold Though none have been proven in court, allegations of rape, slavery and shooting protestors with rubber bullets don't burnish the image of the Canadian mining industry, especially when it's trying to earn social licence for mines in countries that often present complicated social, eco- nomic, political and environmental challenges. However, mining investment can be a powerful trig- ger for positive change, says one of B.C.'s biggest industry boosters. Mark O'Dea is a Newfoundland-raised geologist and mining entrepreneur who sold publicly traded Fron- teer Gold to U.S. titan Newmont Mining Corp. for $2.3 billion in 2011. He's also a winner of the Association for Mineral Exploration British Columbia's Murray Pezim Award for perseverance and success in •nancing mineral exploration. O'Dea is no stranger to launching mining ven- tures abroad. As founder and chair of Vancouver-based investment •rm Oxygen Capital Corp., he has interests in projects in Ontario, Nevada, Turkey and the West African nation of Burkina Faso. Although O'Dea wouldn't comment on Tahoe and Nev- sun's legal troubles, he thinks negative stories involving Canadian mining companies overshadow the economic good that mines bring to developing nations. He points to Karma, a gold mine in Burkina Faso that he developed through one of his companies, True Gold Mining. O'Dea says the US$130-million project brought opportunities to a region of the country that was previously without industry and "desolate," though it also ran into protests from local populations that brie—y suspended its construction in 2015. "Over several years we created 1,000 jobs, with spin- o™s to local business, and we dammed a seasonal river to provide year-round water," O'Dea says. "That's a lasting bene•t; that's long-term." The mining sector does a poor job of telling its own good news story, he adds. Tahoe didn't respond to requests for comment, but the company's story in Guatemala is much more nuanced than you'd gather from sordid tales of security forces •ring indiscriminately on protesters. Many Guatemalans, both mine workers and business owners, support Escobal. Yet the project remains mired in controversy, and e™orts by mine managers and Guatemalan government ožcials to suppress local dissent are well documented. While Tahoe was preparing to defend itself in B.C. Supreme Court this past summer, troubles continued to mount at its Guatemalan silver mine. In July, Escobal protester Ángel Estuardo Quevedo was murdered, and A Rich Vein CANADIAN AND B.C. MINING BY THE NUMBERS DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 BCBUSINESS 45 BCBUSINESS.CA SOURCES: Mining Association of Canada, PwC Canada No.3 Where Canada's mining supply sector and its more than 3,700 firms rank worldwide 13 Major minerals and metals of which Canada is a top-five global producer 100+ Countries where Canadian mining companies operate 8 Metal mines in B.C. in 2016, third among Canadian provinces after Quebec (20) and Ontario (18) $11.7 billion Gross 2017 revenue from B.C. mining operations surveyed by PwC Canada, a 35 % year-over-year increase "We're not without problems as an industry. But I'd say as a country, we're doing more than most to address conflicts that arise between companies and the communities in which they operate overseas. I also think that we're seeing more companies adopt- ing progressive and proactive policies on their own" –Ben Chalmers, VP of sustainable development, Mining Association of Canada

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