The amount of lost opportunity bad government policy spawns is apparent in the latest Eunomix case study, which puts a R400-billion-plus loss tag on the Zambian nationalisation sojourn. Read on page 6 of this edition of Mining Weekly of Eunomix MD Claude Baissac calculating that $45-billion in mining rents went begging as a result of former President Kenneth Kaunda’s 1969 decision, an amount considerably greater than the foreign aid Zambia received in those years.
In a just-completed major study using World Bank data, Eunomix analyses the role of mining and oil and gas in Africa’s economic growth from 1970 to 2010 and tracks the relationship between economic growth, resource rents and commodity prices. It finds that Zambia would have generated mineral rents totalling $65-billion if it had continued to produce copper at a rate of 700 000 t a year over the 40-year period.
Instead, postnationalisation it eked out only $15-billion. Baissac fears that the current resource nationalism trend risks a return of resource sterilisation, which the continent suffered in the 1970s.
JSE-listed drilling services provider Master Drilling has been awarded a contract worth more than R1-billion to provide drilling services to Kumba Iron Ore’s new Kolomela mine, in the Northern Cape. Read on page 10 of this edition of Mining Weekly of the company also being awarded a long-term gold project contract in Mali and signing an agreement in Colombia, which would take effect in the second half of this year.
Joint venture opportunities in Europe and Asia are also being sought. Five per cent of group profit is to be spent on research and development. Master Drilling intends changing its current rand/dollar income ratio of 40:60 to 70:30 in favour of revenue from its African operations. Its 2012 cash balance was at a positive $49.6-million compared with a negative $1.6-million in the previous year.
A membrane used to separate waste from water is aimed at cleaning up South Africa’s acid mine drainage water, as well as desalination to kidney dialysis. Read on page 10 of this edition of Mining Weekly of the role that Witwatersrand University researchers played in collaboration with the North American Space Agency. The university hopes to use the technology in the development of a commercial product.