JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – The Chamber of Mines (CoM) has recommended that a portion of mining royalties be ring-fenced to benefit mining-impacted communities.
Presenting at the Human Rights Commission National Investigative Hearings on the underlying socioeconomic challenges of mining-affected communities, it added that this practice was already in place in countries such as Ghana, Guinea and Argentina.
Almost 20% of the royalties, it said, were ring-fenced for the mining-impacted communities to enable them to deal with in-migration and other impacts of mining.
Local mining companies paid almost R5.4-billion to the National Treasury over the 2015/16 period.
Meanwhile, the CoM welcomed an improvement to the social and labour plan (SLP) model of social delivery, particularly in ensuring that the projects miners undertook reflected a consultative process, undertaken with legitimate representatives and that the projects addressed the developmental needs of the community in which they operated.
“Approval process for SLPs should be expedited to enable better transparency,” it added.