Rosia Montana Gold Corporation, majority owned by Canada’s Gabriel Resources, will lay off 80 percent of its employees because of the Romanian authorities’ delays to evaluate and approve the gold mining project at Rosia Montana, according to a statement of the company, quoted by local Hotnews.ro.

As a result, 373 of the total 481 employees will lose their jobs as of April this year.

RMGC says in a statement that the company has to take this measure due to “unreasonably high delays in authorization procedures for the mining project in Rosia Montana and the uncertainty about the outcome of these procedures,” reports Hotnews.ro.

As of April, around 1,000 families in the area will lose their income source once the company reduces its activity, meaning it will lay off most of its employees and will stop all social and investment programs in the area, according to the company’s statement.

The company previously announced this measure. In March, RMGC said it will lay off most of its staff in Romania in May this year, if the gold mining project, still stuck on lack of approvals, does not go any further.

Over the years, the gold mining project at Rosia Montana in Romania has triggered many controversies, the use of cyanide and the landscape destruction brought by the project being the main concerns and reasons for criticism. Protests against the project were staged all across Romania in autumn last year.

A parliamentary commission tasked with revising the project rejected it in November last year. Also, in December, the Romanian Parliament rejected the new Mining Law which would have allowed the controversial gold mining project at Rosia Montana to start.

Irina Popescu, irina.popescu@romania-insider.com