Gag Island
Coordinates: 0°27′0″S 129°52′0″E / 0.45000°S 129.86667°E
Gag Island is one of the Raja Ampat Islands in the Indonesian province of West Papua. It is situated some 150 kilometres west of Sorong, the provincial capital.
The island's population is approximately 450 living at Gambier Bay. This community was established in the early 1960s by people moving to the island in the hope of finding work with nickel exploration ventures at that time.
Economy
PT Gag Nikel is company formed in 1996 as a joint venture agreement between BHP Billiton (75%) and Indonesia's state-owned mining company, PT Aneka Tambang Tbk (25%). A contract of work was awarded in February 1998, and a program of exploration and preliminary evaluation was conducted. In late 1999, the Indonesian government enacted a forestry law prohibiting open cast mining in "protection forest" areas. The forest on Gag Island was subsequently reclassified as "protection forest", stopping any mining activity on the island. Subsequent to these events, the Contract of Work for Gag Island was suspended. No exploration work on the island has been undertaken since late 1999.
Sources
- BHP Billiton's website on sustainability