Australian mining company BHP Billiton has handed over the Olympics medals in preparation for August’s Games. From Bloomberg:
Six thousand medals — sourced from BHP mines in Australia and Chile — were handed to organizers of the Beijing Olympics and Paralympics, 37 days before the first will be awarded.
[…] The 2,000 gold medals — each plated with at least six grams (0.2 ounces) of the precious metal — were minted from 13.04 kilograms of gold from BHP’s Escondida mine in Chile. The bulk of the medal is made from silver from Cannington in Queensland and smelted in China.
[…] Melbourne-based BHP used 1,340kg of silver in the gold and silver medals, with the 830kg of copper for the bronze medals coming from its Spence mine in Chile. The world’s biggest mining company is a sponsor of the Beijing Olympics and China accounted for 20 percent of its sales last year, almost double the share three years before.
See also a post from the Wall Street Journal’s China blog on the medals. Read more about BHP Billiton in China, via CDT. Also, in case there was any doubt, the White House is confirming that President Bush will attend the opening ceremonies in Beijing.
