The failure to sell the second-largest diamond ever recovered came as a surprise. The build-up to the sale of the Lesedi La Rona diamond was considerable. At last month’s Botswana Resources Sector Conference, strong reference was made to the 1 109 ct diamond that was heading for auction in London. But a bid of $61-million did not meet the undisclosed minimum reserve price. As can be read on page 20 of this edition of Mining Weekly, before Lucara recovered Lesedi, its COO, Paul Day, recalled that a reputable diamond broker from Europe had advised the company that the best thing that could be done with a 1 000 ct would be to return it to the pit and smash it, on the grounds that it would never sell. But Lucara put its “heart and soul” into proving the broker wrong, Day told the conference. Has the broker now been proved correct? Given that the 812.77 ct Constellation from the same Karowe mine sold for $63.11-million in May, it does not seem so.
Facilities for the advancement of research and development for mining are returning fast after a regrettable lull. Last month, Mining Weekly announced the reopening of the old Chamber of Mines Research Organisation (Comro) facility in Carlow Road under Council for Scientific and Industrial Research manager for mining and mineral resources Navin Singh, and now, on page 14 of this edition of Mining Weekly, details are provided on the University of the Witwatersrand’s new Wits Mining Institute, which will house the school’s already advanced digital mine project plus a college network tasked with the development of twenty-first-century artisan and technician skills. It will augment the already substantial work being done within the School of Mining Engineering through its Centre for Mechanised Mining Systems and the Centre for Sustainability in Mining and Industry in the belief that more efficient mining is within reach, provided developers are prepared to apply advanced technologies that are already available. Not far away, Comro is also intent on bringing the best out of South Africa’s narrow-reef orebodies, which present a host of difficulties.
Last month, Corruption Watch’s report on transparency in corporate reporting identified mining companies as the most transparent in the country. Since then, reports have been filtering through from large concerns to reinforce that finding. Many top concerns are committed to a laudable new degree of openness. The latest to display this is global diversified mining and marketing company Glencore. In a 17-page outline, Glencore CFO Steve Kalmin last week provided an overview of the $5-billion it paid last year to 16 governments, ranging from Argentina to Zambia and including South Africa. An article on the company’s 2015 report can be found on page 60 of this edition of Mining Weekly. In it, the London-, Hong Kong- and Johannesburg-listed company nails its colours to the mast of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative. Glencore’s size and longterm operational make-up mean that it is able to contribute significantly to host countries through the payment of taxes, royalties, employees’ wages and monies to local suppliers. An important factor in all this is that the potential for corruption is lowered through financial openness.