If any proof were needed to support the belief that Africa has become one of the world’s epicentres for mining success over the last decade, one arguably needs to look no further than Randgold Resources. An Africa-focused gold mining and exploration company, it has been the architect behind a host of major discoveries to date in Mali, the Côte d’Ivoire, Senegal and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

In 2006 when he seriously started to sell his conviction that Greenland would be the next game-changer in the global supply chain for minerals, Rod McIllree found that the investment community in his native Australia shared neither his enthusiasm nor his outlook. In Australia not many people had heard of the Ilimaussaq Complex right at the southern tip of Greenland, which had been investigated by geologists from Greenland’s ‘mother country’ Denmark for decades and had been found to be rich in uranium.

The world’s second most used metal after steel, aluminium is blessed with a host of positive characteristics that have made its use invaluable to the modern world. The most common metal found in the earth’s crust, it possesses a remarkably low weight-to-strength ratio, high resistance to corrosion, is easy to shape and is 100 percent recyclable.

SportStream specialises in analysing social media mentions of sport and enables its users to aggregate, filter and display what it describes as “real-time” data. By acquiring the business Facebook will be making it easier for its media partners to find posts about sport on its website and use them in their content.

While mining companies are no strangers to volatility, 2013 stands out as a year of particularly significant shifts. Slower demand out of China and ongoing economic weakness in other parts of the world pushed down commodity prices and threatened to tip certain commodities into over-supply. Despite this softness, both operational and capital costs continued to rise and governments in many jurisdictions continued to demand outsized contributions from the natural resources sector.

The report predicts that employment in the mining sector will rise by 7.4 percent over the next four years, with the oil and gas sector providing the largest number of new jobs. However, with this comes the need for new skills to be adopted amongst the workforce.

The deal, estimated to have cost Intel around $25 million, will see the chipmaker’s logo appear on the inside of players’ shirts. This means that the Intel logo will be on display when players lift their shirts in celebration of scoring a goal. The partnership will also see Intel providing technology to the clubs players and its coaching staff.

The measure opens up state-run oil fields to foreign investment, allowing private firm to explore and extract oil and gas alongside the state-run company Pemex, and subsequently claim a share of any profits made.

Following the Senate vote President Enrique Pena Nieto wrote on Twitter that it was "a significant decision for Mexico". Mr Pena Nieto said it was necessary to modernise Mexico's energy sector and increase oil production, which has dropped from 3.4 million barrels per day in 2004 to the current rate of 2.5 million barrels per day.