JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – The South African government has invited mining law stalwart Peter Leon to be part of the mining industry's growth, development and employment task team (Migdett).
Department of Mineral Resources DG Sandile Nogxina has invited Leon to participate as a regulatory and legal expert in Migdett's competitiveness body that will consider a wide spectrum of issues that affect the competitiveness and growth of South Africa's mining industry.
Government, labour and business established Migdett in December 2008 to help the industry manage the negative effects of the global economic crisis, save jobs and to position the industry for growth and transformation in the medium-to-long term.
Migdett is focused on producing a draft strategy by the start of the proposed Mining Summit, which will take place on March 30 and 31.
The inaugural meeting of the competitiveness task team took place on Monday, February 15.
Leon coheads law firm Webber Wentzel's mining, energy and natural resources practice group as an expert in South African and African natural resources law, broad-based black economic-empowerment, financial services regulation, as well as international investment law.
He also currently serves as the chairperson of the International Bar Association's mining law committee.
At the summit, government, business and labour have agreed to position South Africa's mining industry for "sustainable growth and meaningful transformation".
The decision was taken when the industry's leadership met at a Migdett plenary last month, which Nogxina convened.
At that meeting, it was noted that Migdett had already managed to limit the number of mining job losses during the global economic slump, from an initial estimate of 100 000 to about 50 000.
Against the backdrop of the green offshoots of an economic recovery, Migdett is now committed to shifting its focus towards positioning the mining industry for the "inevitable upswing" and ensuring higher growth, the creation of "decent jobs" and transformation.
At the plenary, it was agreed that the Migdett process would examine all industry aspects, including the review of the Mining Charter, in preparation for the March summit.
The leadership concurred that the process was "critically important" and had agreed to engage "constructively" to ensure that the key aims of sustainable growth, jobs and transformation were achieved.
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