The matter of royalties is first and foremost a matter of provincial jurisdiction. That said, the international agreements signed by Canada are important and may have an effect on future provincial and territorial policies. That's why it's important for you to be concerned.
Basically, the debate and the issues raised in Quebec are about non-renewable resources. As I said earlier, they are being exploited for an approximate value of $8 billion this year and $7 billion last year. Of this money, how much profit did the open-pit mines make last year? We can't get these figures from the ministère des Finances du Québec, but the Coalition Pour que le Québec ait meilleure mine estimates that these profits amount to between $2 billion and $3 billion. This money goes directly into the pockets of private shareholders.
We say that these are collective resources. They belong not only to all Quebeckers but also to all Canadians. They are non-renewable. Once they've been extracted, they don't come back. So we are responsible, as collective owners and trustees of this resource for our nation and the Canadian nation, to ensure we receive fair compensation.
As things stand, the royalty regimes in Quebec collected $300 million last year, for profits of $7 billion, which represents 4.5%. If we add Quebec income tax and other taxes to the royalties, we get a total of $700 million. So we can say that in all 10% of the gross worth ended up in Quebec's coffers in 2010. I don't have any figures for the federal portion, but it must be between $100 million and $200 million, maybe $300 million, maximum.
The company PricewaterhouseCoopers estimates that profits from the 40 biggest mining companies in the world has increased by 1,000% in the past eight years. We say that, in view of this huge profit margin, these record profits, Quebeckers and Canadians in general are not getting their fair share of our non-renewable wealth. We suggest basically—