Mining company Quebec Cartier

The Mining Compagnie Quebec Cartier is a mining company Canadian founded in 1959. It is one of the Canadian leading vendors of products of iron ore intended for the worldwide market of steel.

It employs 1800 workers in its installations of Fermont and Port-Cartier like in its administrative offices of Montreal and Bruxelle.

Birth of Quebec Cartier

It is on January 26th, 1957 that starts the great adventure of the mining Company Quebec Cartier. At this time, U.S. Steel of Pittsburgh founds Quebec Cartier Mining in order to exploit the iron layers of the Quebec-Labrador pit. This American company had already noted the ferruginous potential since 1952. In 1959, the Mine begins the exploitation from the layer of the lake Jeannine. The creation of the company will require immense investments amounting to 350 million dollars. The amount of the invoice includes/understands in particular the construction of a port, the creation of the town of Gagnon and a concentrator as well as the construction of a railway line of 308 kilometers. It is on October 6th, 1962 that the first ore exports will be carried out towards the American steel-works and the European market.

Establishment in Port-Cartier

Although the mine is in Gagnon, close to the lake Jeannine, the harbor installations are located, as for them, in edge of sea, on Coast-North. It is the village of Shelter Bay which accommodates the new company then. The arrival of this new player transforms the local landscape radically. Indeed, a new residential, commercial and Community portrait will take shape in the east of the River to the Rocks. The new town of Port-Cartier will thus be born in February 1959.

The adventure fermontoise

October 15th, 1974, it is the explosion of the " calotte" Wright mount which marks the beginning of the exploitation with Fermont as well as the birth of this municipality. Still today, the iron ore of Quebec Cartier is extracted at this place, in the area of Caniapiscau. The displacement of the activities towards Fermont is explained by the exhaustion of the mine of the lake Jeannine. Considerable sums were invested besides to develop the Wright mount: addition of a section of 150 kilometers railway, installation of a new concentrator, creation of a new city, including/understanding the famous " mur".

Sidbec-Normines

Under the impulse of the intervention of the government of Quebec, a factory of pelletizing will be created in Port-Cartier. The investment is then shared between the American interests of Quebec Cartier (9%), British Steel (41%) and Sidbec-Normines, company of State (50%). The building work starts in June 1975 and the production of the factory begins in 1977. In addition, the arrival of Sidbec-Normines, company independent of Quebec Cartier, prolongs the lifespan of the town of Gagnon, in particular by the exploitation of Lake Fire. In the years 1990, the mining Company Quebec Cartier will supplement the purchase of the factory of pelletizing.

The crisis of the iron of the years 1980

It is important to greet the strength with which the Mine faces the crisis of iron during the years 1980. At the time, the reorganization is accompanied by the closing of the mine of Lake Fire and the closing of the town of Gagnon (mining site of the lake Jeannine). It is as for this period as the responsibilities for Quebec Cartier will extend to the factory from pelletizing. As an article of Robert Savard underlines it, in the Sun: " It is in 1988, under the presidency of Giorgio Massobrio, that the company determines its position: to illustrate itself among the largest producers of the international market of the fer". According to the same author, the Mine will know a notable evolution thereafter. It is the first to obtain a certificate of Francization in 1987. Moreover, in 1995, the CMQC becomes the first mine in the world to be qualified for the standard ISO 9001.

The years 2000

Close to the bankruptcy, the mining Company Quebec Cartier was belonged in a remarkable way to a crisis felt in 2002 in the medium of iron. Starts again which is explained according to Michele Boisvert, chroniqueure economic for the Press, by the common implication of the State, the private partners, the management of the firm and the employees of the organization. Indeed, in 2002, the government pequist of Bernard Landry grants a loan the Mine, respected by the liberals of Jean Charest. The effectiveness of the company and the engagement of the medium (bankers and suppliers), of the owners Dofasco and Caemi and the employees who accepted a gel of wages, then contributed to the success of the operation. The whole, of course, compound, with the Chinese request for the products of iron.

Currently, the CMQC is a property of the Ontarian steel-works Dofasco. The latter is at present with the hands of the new giant of steel ArcelorMittal.

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