Science Technology Minister Mosibudi Mangena has reaffirmed government commitment to increasing South Africa’s research and development (R&D) expenditure to over 1% of gross domestic product (GDP) from its current level of about 0,7%.

Speaking during Mintek’s 70th anniversary celebrations last week, Mangena lamented the fall in R&D spend, suggesting that it was the result of a termination of key technology missions such as defence, energy and food security.

“This reduction came at a time when the national system of innovation needed to expand to cope with the needs of 40-million citizens, as opposed to only five-million or six-million that was previously catered for,” he added.

“The goal of the Department of Science and Technology is to increase the country’s R&D spending to about 1%, by identifying specific areas in which we can excel.

“The National R&D Strategy, which was approved by Cabinet in 2002, recognises that, given South Africa’s limited resources compared with other nations, the successful promotion of R&D requires building on our natural strengths, including mining and minerals processing, which have long been a cornerstone of our economy.”

Mangena also pointed out that Mintek faced the challenge of developing technologies to assist new entrants to the mining industry, operating at various scales.

He said it also would have to play a role in addressing key areas of the mining charter, human resources development and poverty alleviation.

However, he congratulated the organisation on its achievements thus far, pointing out that, while similar specialised bodies internationally have become smaller, or have ceased to exist, Mintek has not only grown from strength to strength, but has also firmly established itself as a world leader in the fields of metals and minerals technology development.

“This is a noteworthy achievement, which also points to the strategic and economic importance of South Africa’s mineral wealth.”

Mintek has been involved with numerous projects throughout its existence.

The Minister briefly outlined the organisation’s successes.

“During the 1930s, shortly after its founding as the Minerals Research Laboratory at the University of the Witwatersrand, one of Mintek’s first investigations entailed the beneficiation of corundum being mined by what we would call in today’s terms, artisanal miners in the then northern Transvaal,” Mangena said.

“In the 1950s, a major effort was expended on a wide-ranging collaborative programme to develop technology for extracting uranium from the Witwatersrand gold ores – then a matter of national strategic importance.”

He said that the 1970s and 1980s were marked by the development, in close collaboration with industry, of a number of ‘breakthrough’ technologies which produced an industry-wide impact on productivity, and for which Mintek became renowned. These include carbon-in-pulp for gold recovery, which rapidly became the industry standard internationally. The process for recovering platinum-group metals from the UG2 reef of the Bushveld Complex led to a major expansion of South Africa’s platinum-group metals industry.

Mangena also mentioned that, at the end of the 1980s, Mintek’s operating framework changed as it began a transition to greater self-sufficiency, which not only gained it greater autonomy, but also pushed it towards aggressive commercialisation of its new technologies.

“At that time Mintek set itself a target of achieving a level of 50% commercial funding and 50% State funding, which was thought by some to be an impossible goal. As it turns out, currently only 35% of Mintek’s budget is now sourced from the core funding – the remainder is from commercial activities and competitive funding from the Innovation Fund. The optimal ratio will depend on to what extent new technologies are being developed or existing technologies being depleted,” he said.

“But at this stage, any further increase in the ratio of private-to-State funding would probably come at a cost of endangering long-term precompetitive research.”

In 2002, Mintek became one of the first science councils to ring-fence its science vote funds, which are used primarily for medium- and long-term technology development, with portions allocated to human capacity building and socio-economic development.

In the same year, Mintek also established its wholly-owned commercial subsidiary, Mindev, which already has four operating projects that are essentially joint ventures. The motivation behind Mindev was to ensure that Mintek derives benefits from the technology it develops, while ensuring that the gains from the commercialisation of its technology are reinvested in the organisation to fund long-term research.

“Work done in these areas is likely to impact positively on developments in the mining sector both locally and internationally,” he said.

“Through its 70 years of existence, we believe that Mintek has gathered enough experience and expertise to cope with changing demands for the metals and mining sector, which have prepared it to tackle future challenges with the success it has shown in the past.”