KOLKATA (miningweekly.com) – India’s Mines Ministry will make it mandatory for mines to get rated under the ‘five-star’ rating mechanism based on sustainability parameters, moving away from a self-regulatory model.
According to a government official, the government is considering amendments to the Mineral Conservation and Development Rules to force all operational mines to make disclosures and submit details to the Indian Bureau of Mines (IBM), in a shift from the self-regulatory model adopted at the launch of the mine rating mechanism in July this year.
An IBM official has explained that the country’s 1 800 operational mines have been slow in getting their mines rated. In fact, an IBM review into the causes of a poor response revealed that, given their existing parameters, only 700 of the total operational mines would qualify for the basic star rating.
With a negligible number of mines coming forth voluntarily to get rated, IBM has started holding road shows across mineral-bearing provinces to coax mine operators into submitting details before the exercise will become mandatory.
The star rating mechanism was introduced to allow communities and environmental organisations to assess how responsible mines are.
The mechanism requires mines to submit detailed parameters on socioeconomic indicators at the mine location, best practices adopted under the United Nations Sustainable Development Framework and an environmental-impact assessment on a Web-based application to determine a mine’s star rating, from one to five stars, with five being the highest.
Failure by a mine to improve its star rating for two subsequent audit periods will make the mine liable for closure.
Government officials have acknowledged that the poor response to the rating system may be for reasons not entirely in control of mine owners. It was pointed out that several mines, particularly iron-ore mines could not be rated as many of them were not in operation for the minimum 180 days as mandated. For example a large number of iron-ore mines in Goa had remained closed for various reasons ranging from monsoon rains to delays in securing fresh environment clearances after the Indian Supreme Court closed down all mines few years ago for violations of mining and environmental laws.
However, given the slow pace of rating, the officials that Mining Weekly Online spoke to were not willing to guess whether the target to get all Indian operational mines to get a minimum four-star rating within the next three years would be met.