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Monday, December 7, 2009.

From Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I'm Shannon de Ryhove.

Making headlines today:

Platinum-miner Lonmin has reached a two-year wage agreement with the National Union of Mineworkers with regard to workers at its Marikana operation, in North West province.

Employees will receive a 10% wage increase for the first year of the agreement, which will be backdated to October 1, 2009.

Lonmin reports that they will be entitled to an increase of consumer price inflation plus 2% in the second year of the agreement.

Transnet acting CEO Chris Wells says that the commodity corridors in South Africa are likely to be the main beneficiaries of the State-owned transport utility's expanded five-year capital investment programme.

He says that the new plan will probably involve a 10% increase in the budget of the current rolling plan, which stands at 80,5-billion-rand. The new plan will be unveiled in February.

The group has two main commodity lines: the coal line, linking the coalfields of Mpumalanga province with the export terminal at Richards Bay; and the iron-ore line from Sishen to Saldanha.

Wells says that the main focus will be on the procurement and upgrading of locomotives and wagons for the commodity lines. However, he stressed that these projects still had to receive board approval.

The group has invested 62-billion-rand over the last four-and-half years in the upgrading and modernising of existing facilities, as well as in expanding infrastructure capacity.

Also making headlines:

Botswana is compelled to honour an agreement to support a rights issue by diamond producer De Beers.
Diversified miner Rio Tinto teams up with the University of Queensland to establish an 11-million-dollar sorting centre.
ASX-listed Red 5 secures financing for its Philippines gold project.
And, JSE-listed Metorex recommends that shareholders approve the Vergenoeg deal.

That's a round up of news making headlines today. For more on these and other stories please visit miningweekly.com.