Zambia-based mining contracting company Murray & Roberts Cementation has been awarded the shaft sinking and equipping contract for the synclinorium shaft for miner Mopani Copper Mines’ Nkana mine, in Zambia.

The new shaft is expected to add about 25 years to the life of the Nkana copper and cobalt mine, near Kitwe.

The main shaft, which will be 1 200 m deep with a 7 m diameter, will be equipped as a rock-hoisting shaft on this brownfield mine to service a new area under development.

A 6-m-diameter raise bore ventilation shaft will form part of the full project. By 2018, the new shaft will boost Nkana’s ore production from 3.4-million tons a year to 5.1-million tons a year.

Mopani Copper Mines, owned by majority shareholder and multi- national miner and commodities trader Glencore International, is an integrated copper and cobalt producer located on the Zambian Copperbelt.

Mopani’s operations comprise four underground mines, a concentrator, a cobalt plant, in Kitwe, and an underground mine, concentrator, smelter and refinery in the town of Mufulira.

Murray & Roberts Cement-ation business development executive Allan Widlake says: “People remain Murray & Roberts Cementation’s most valuable asset.

“Our business culture is designed to promote safety through our ‘Stop. Think’ campaign, risk assessments, training and the observation and coaching of employees to promote our ‘zero harm‘ aim.”

The organisation’s Business Management System actively drives safe business outcomes, while its 1st Choice programme promotes the correct behaviours, values and principles that ensure this safety culture is grown from within.

Further, the company’s Bentley Park training facility, near Carletonville, provides a training service that produces skilled operators who can apply what they have learnt to ensure a safe outcome on site.