“We do not disagree with reviewing the electricity tariff, but what we ask for is transparency, because there is no subsidy to mining, it is a sunk cost and a tariff deficit,” countered Carolina Orozco, president of the Board of Directors of the Mining Chamber of Ecuador, speaking on national television on Wednesday.

“It should be acknowledged that this subsidy, sunk cost, tariff deficit, does not benefit mining companies alone, because all Ecuadoreans benefit from it,” Orozco added.

Orozco stood for the mining sector, claiming that it is the fourth largest source of income feeding the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), generating almost 600 million dollars in tax revenues and more than 1.9 billion dollars in exports, she recalled.

National Assembly’s President Viviana Veloz, in turn, agreed that citizens cannot continue subsidizing the energy consumption of large mining companies.

Veloz added that this should be included in the Urgent Economic Bill that President Daniel Noboa recently forwarded to the Legislature.

Ied/iff/mem/nta