A company has abandoned a High Court appeal against a decision rejecting its application to mine up to 50 million tonnes of black sand off the West Coast seabed.

The rock-star economy will give an encore next year, says the economist who attached that label to New Zealand.

With $1 trillion spent on projects to feed a commodity boom since 2002, the world's mining firms have a lot riding on China.

For a long time the Lucky Country drew Kiwis to its shores, but as its economy changes we look at some of the risks of relocating to Australia.

Families of 29 dead mine workers have finally conceded that the men's bodies will never be recovered from the Pike River coal mine.

Solid Energy has announced it will not re-enter the Pike River Mine drift because the company considers the risks to life remain too high. Read the latest selection of Your Views on the decision.

Billionaire Gina Rinehart has quit the board of the Ten Network to focus on the construction of her giant iron ore project.

Mario Sepulveda is weeping. Amid the clatter and din of the building site where he works in the Chilean capital of Santiago, Sepulveda's voice can hardly be heard as it comes in great heaving sobs.

Diamonds are so hard to find that explorers have pretty much given up trying.

For nearly a year, it turns out, the Pike River mine could have been made safe to enter.

Miner and steelmaker Arrium is asking its shareholders to cough up more than A$750 million ($829 million) to pay down its debt pile in the face of sliding iron ore prices.

Twenty freelance miners, including 16-year-old Leber Gonzales above, have been rescued after being trapped deep underground for more than 24 hours.

Wildlife biologist Nick Mooney says open cut mines in Tasmania could prove to be safe havens for endangered Tasmanian devils.

Tugboat crews are threatening to disrupt shipments from the world's biggest iron ore port as they negotiate for increased wages.

As prices for iron ore are projected to slip, cattle is becoming more attractive to Australian mining companies.

Taranaki oil and gas explorer Tag Oil, of Canada, is expanding into the New Zealand minerals sector through its 49 per cent ownership of a listed Canadian explorer.

Tag Oil of Canada has been awarded five mineral exploration permits to hunt for platinum in the South Island.

An overwhelming number of experienced Stockton mineworkers have volunteered for redundancy because they're fed up, says a worker.

Stockton mineworkers got the bad news they were expecting today, that more than 180 jobs will go - over a quarter of the workforce - and mine production will fall by 25 per cent.

Gina Rinehart's son John Hancock called his youngest sister "an oxygen thief".

Australian state governments spent A$17.6 billion on subsidies for mineral and fossil fuel industries over six years, including A$8 billion to help transport coal.

Editorial: During the passage of legislation establishing a new regime for activity in NZ's exclusive economic zone, environmentalists fretted the Govt had got the balance wrong.

Mining industry leaders are in shock over the rejection of an application to mine ironsands from off the coast of southern Taranaki.

Coal dominated world energy markets last year by supplying the biggest share of demand since 1970, making it the fastest growing fossil fuel, according to an annual review by BP.