Mining billionaire Gina Rinehart has stepped up her criticism of governments for imposing too many costs on the mining sector amid a commodity price downturn.
A protracted slump in iron ore prices has put many miners under financial pressure, and Ms Rinehart says government costs need to be reviewed to keep Australian miners competitive.
"If Australia doesn't supply iron ore, there's other countries who will, so we need to do what we can to cut Australia's high costs, and the even higher Pilbara ones in particular," Ms Rinehart said as she accepted a lifetime achievement award at the Mines and Money conference in Hong Kong.
"That's where Australian governments come in, or should come in.
"They need to recognise that they need to come to the party and recognise falling commodity prices, and cut the horrific expense of their regulations and compliance burdens."
Prices have been falling since early 2014, but there's no evidence to date than any government, state or federal, have made any progress on this, she said.
Ms Rinehart's $US10 billion ($A13.19 billion) Roy Hill iron ore project, which is 76 per cent complete and is expected to begin shipping exports in six months, has had to satisfy more than 4,000 regulations and approvals, she said.
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