South Africans have tried to develop a junior mining exploration culture several times over but have not been able to come anywhere close to the aplomb of other mining jurisdictions that have a far stronger geological appetite.
The many junior mining companies listed in Canada, Australia and on Aim, in the UK, are quickest off the mark, even in the South African minerals environment, and they should be given every encouragement to take the lead.
They also seem to get prospecting licences where South Africans cannot, in spite of the South African Mineral Resource Administration System (Samrad) of the Department of Mineral Resources (DMR), which is a monumental constraint.
Many other mining destinations in Africa and in the world make South Africa look stupid when it comes to online cadastre access to the availability of mineral rights and, ironically, many of these countries use an online cadastre system developed in South Africa by South Africans for South Africans.
Yet South Africa’s DMR stubbornly adheres to doing its own thing abominably badly.
Interestingly, this has caused eyebrows to raise at Corruption Watch, which cautions that South Africa’s lack of mineral rights transparency increases the opportunity for corruption.
As reported in Mining Weekly, there has also been an instance of officialdom deliberately refusing to process mineral licence applications, which points to the subjective nature of the current inept system.
In this regard, the recent ‘Mining for Sustainable Development’ report, compiled as part of a research initiative driven by Transparency International and supported by Corruption Watch, raises important issues and identifies the gaps that open the way to maladministration.
Action must be taken to overcome the internal capacity constraints that cause prolonged delays in the processing of applications.
Existing backlogs must be eliminated and Samrad replaced with something that works.
In the meantime, the few explorers that have lifted their heads above the prospecting parapets are funded largely from abroad.
Local mining sector momentum needs to be vastly speeded up and Chamber of Mines president Mxolisi Mgojo is correct to insist on a restart, beginning with a collective national vision that goes well beyond the narrow-minded short-sightedness of the Ministry of Mineral Resources and the DMR.
Rather than a single Mineral Resources Ministry ruling the roost, Mgojo is correct to discern that Ministries across a broad spectrum need to become intimately involved, along with National Treasury, the private sector, unions and civil society, if mining is to reach its full potential as the main driver of this economy.
As the custodians of this country’s mineral rights since 1994, the public and private sectors, along with union and civil society leadership, must be made aware of their responsibilities towards the $2.3-trillion worth of mineral wealth, which is worthless if it remains in the ground, but which can put our economy back into gear if advanced under a shared vision that is viable, inclusive and transformative.
The reward will be the injection of new life into a stagnant economy.