Mining lobby group Straterra is claiming "encouraging progress" with the new Government and is broadly hinting legislative reviews will lead to the opening up of land access for the mining industry.
"The new government is listening to our messages and we are very encouraged by progress so far.
"We have not just been ignored for the past nine years [by the Labour government] but actively discouraged; in what is a $4 billion sector contribution to the economy," Mr Dow said.
Mr Dow highlighted the creation of the Energy and Resources portfolio, headed by third-ranked Cabinet minister Gerry Brownlee, which Straterra had promoted, and also the Government's review of the Department of Conservation and Resource Management Act, the latter considered a mining-unfriendly impediment by many companies.
He believed once those reviews were complete, there would be "some parts of New Zealand not accessible in the past which will be open to the [mining] industry", backed up by an increasing number of examples where "mining and the environment" were working well together "to create economic benefits".
However, in the meantime, the eight-month-old Straterra still has some housekeeping to take care of, as some members of the diverse and at times fractured oil, gas, gold, coal and aggregates sectors remain cool to joining Straterra.
Straterra's conception was announced in September last year at the New Zealand branches Australian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy conference in Wellington, but immediately ran into some controversy with existing mining-interest associations which could face absorption into the new organisation.
That rift appears no closer to having healed with both the Aggregates and Quarrying Association (AQA) and the Petroleum Exploration and Production Association of New Zealand (Pepanz) still not having joined, while the New Zealand Minerals Industry Association and Coal Association of New Zealand have joined, and Minerals West Coast is still considering membership.
In both instances of the AQA and Pepanz, Straterra chairman John Dow said the former had "narrow issues" to consider and Pepanz "different issues", claiming members of both organisations were showing interest in joining Straterra, a claim rejected by some Pepanz members, who asked not to be identified.
Mr Dow rejected the suggestion Straterra had little to show yet, saying it had been involved in back-room political lobbying since the change of government last year and had not been actively seeking media attention.
• Straterra has just appointed a new chief executive, Richard Michael, who after five years with the Contractors Association replaces the inaugural chief executive, Dr Ian Parton.
