Botswana’s diamond sector is not going to disappear but it is also not going to grow. That was the message from Econsult MD and former Bank of Botswana deputy governor Keith Jefferis when he addressed last week’s Botswana Resource Sector Conference. He also let it be known that foreign direct investment into Botswana has collapsed.
Read on page 7 of this edition of Mining Weekly that Botswana is increasingly a services- driven economy, with big questions marks looming over its planned foray into coal, which was targeted as the economic growth driver to make up for the ex-growth diamonds sector. Fieldstone Africa MD Jonathan Berman told the conference that financial institutions were turning their backs on coal project funding and a way out for Botswana is to embrace the solar power opportunity. He pointed out that Zambia’s new solar tender has been awarded at US 4.7c/kWh and India’s at an even lower US 4.2c/kWh, which showed solar’s competitiveness. (See also page 8 of this edition of Mining Weekly.)
Against the backdrop of Botswana’s diamond industry being in standstill mode, Botswana Diamonds MD James Campbell urged the country to consider adopting the Canadian flow-through incentive scheme to boost exploration – or risk the beginning of the end of its proud diamond history. The flow-through scheme has generated billions of dollars for mineral exploration in Canada, and Campbell believes it could do the same for Botswana, where many old diamond discoveries have yet to be subjected to scrutiny using modern technology. (See page 9 of this edition of Mining Weekly.)
It was good to hear Botswana’s Mineral Resources, Green Technology and Energy Security Minister, Sadique Kebonang, say that the Botswana government is determined to better its legislative framework and policies to ensure the country becomes investor friendly – which Mining Weekly assumed it already was, but which apparently is no longer the case. (See page 14 of this edition of Mining Weekly.)
The addition of ‘green technology’ to his title when it comes to coal providing the growth that diamonds is not, is intriguing, particularly since Botswana is a signatory to the Paris accord on climate change. The Minister spoke of encouraging a low-carbon energy portfolio, which seems to fly in the face of the country’s coal project plans, except perhaps in the case of coalbed methane (CBM). He made a point of reiterating that a request for proposals (RfP) for the development of a 100 MW CBM pilot power plant would close on July 12.
Also presenting was Tlou Energy, which told the conference that it would be making an RfP submission and that it hopes to get power from its Lesedi CBM project on to the Botswana power grid by the second half of 2019. (See also page 14 of this edition of Mining Weekly.)