The 16th Mining and Exploration Forum MINEX Russia was held in Moscow from 6 to 8 October. Reflecting current realities, the forum was held under the central theme «Russian Mining Industry – Unprecedented Challenges and Solutions».
The Forum was organised amid an unprecedented global pandemic that quickly changed the entire world. Profound changes have affected almost all areas of mining and metallurgical industries. In a very short period, the industry had to rebuild production processes and introduce mechanisms to ensure the safety of the health of personnel and the efficiency of enterprise management. These changes and innovative approaches to solving these challenges were widely discussed during the forum.
Hybrid event technology
- Since this year not all speakers and participants were able to physically attend the forum, the MINEX Forum secretariat developed a unique technology for organising conference sessions, exhibition and networking in a hybrid format connecting people participating in-person and online.
- The unique online system enabled real-time Russian or English simultaneous translation of the presentations, panel discussions and Q&As between speakers and delegates.
- The MINEX Forum proprietary web application provided opportunities for expanding and strengthening business ties between virtual and physical participants.
Forum events overview
On 6 October, a series of online master classes were held by ContiTech Rus, SRK Consulting, Seequent and AMC Consultants.
On 7 October, the forum continued in the format of a hybrid event, combining presentations by speakers attending in person and speaking remotely.
Alongside the forum, a physical and virtual exhibition of mining technologies and projects will be held on 7 and 8 October.
At the plenary and technical sessions of the forum, representatives of leading mining companies were presenting their experience in improving operational efficiency in the extreme circumstance caused by the spread of COVID-19. An interesting discussion was organised around promising exploration methods and technologies. The forum also provided a platform for the presentation of innovations and the assessment of advanced achievements in the geological, mining, and metallurgical industries.
Annual Micromine User conference was traditionally held alongside the forum.
In the evening the forum participants greeted the winners the short documentaries festival “MineMovie“, which was organised for the second year in partnership with the First Geological Internet Channel.
The second day of the Forum concluded with the presentation of the 14th Russian Mining Excellence competition awards. Review award results here
The program of the third day of the forum on October 8 was no less intense. In the morning, it began with the session dedicated to personnel management in times of global pandemic, organised jointly with Women in Mining Russia. It was followed by the panel discussion on Environmental, Social and Corporate Governance (ESG) in the Russian mining and metallurgical industry sponsored by Nordgold.
The forum hosted the second conference Mining Goes Digital Russia, dedicated to digital transformation in the mining and metallurgical industry.
MineDigtal competition of innovative digital solutions and technologies was organised alongside the conference.
For the first time, an external meeting of the Expert and Technical Council of the FBU “GKZ” was organised on the sidelines of the forum.
MISiS and Siberian Federal University organised a session “New mining projects – new personnel” to present modern practices, challenges, and projects in the Russian Higher Mining Education system. The session has brought together industry representatives attending the Forum in-person and over 50 Universities from Moscow, Krasnoyarsk, St. Petersburg, Kuzbass, Irkutsk connecting online.
The organising committee of the MINEX Russia forum sincerely thanks all sponsors and partners for their support, which is even more valuable in these difficult times. We sincerely hope that the Russian mining industry will effectively solve the challenges it faces, and that the Forum next year will return from the “remote” format to more familiar face-to-face meetings.
We wish all the forum participants business success and good health.
MINEX Russia 2020 Forum Secretariat
MINEX Russia 2020 Forum materials will be available after 2 November 2020.
The materials will include video recordings and slides presented at the masterclasses, plenary and technical sessions of the forum. The publication will also include a video recording of the innovative technologies presented at the MineDigital competition. To access presentation slides prior to the official release of the publication, you can contact the speakers by filling out a request form on their personal pages. The list of speakers is available via this link.
Free access to the forum materials will be provided to all delegates, exhibitors, speakers, sponsors, and media partners via their personal accounts.
Participants of associated events and visitors of the exhibition who did not pay the registration fee can purchase access to the materials by filling out an order form using the link.