Mining`s Structural Problems Cannot Be Hidden Underground

“Now what state do (we) live in? - 'Denial”. Bill Watterson, the creator of the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes, could very well have been referring to South Africa and our approach to the structural Titanic we like to call the mining sector.

As zama-zama miners engage in running gun battles near the township of Daveyton, the Portfolio Committee on Mining, together with all the major stakeholders call for more policing to resolve the problem. This perennial state of denial is what led to the deaths of 44 miners in Marikana three years ago, and before that the deaths of 86 informal miners at the Harmony Gold mine. It allows what should rightly signal the need for urgent change, to be swept under the carpet until the next tragedy or massacre. 

Instead of seeing these events as watersheds that should spur us on to greater equality and justice, we instead reinforce the status quo in which the structural deficiencies of the mining sector are overlooked as the source of the problem. Instead we are told that this growing problem is one of criminality, not poverty.

Mining, we are constantly reminded, is the backbone of the South African economy. It has turned a 19^th century nascent agricultural economy into the world`s leading gold supplier during the 20^th century and into a sinking Titanic in the 21^st century.

As one of the most exploitative, extractive and violent industries in the world, the structural make-up of the industry has hardly changed over the course of 150 years of mining in South Africa. It has simultaneously created enormous pockets of wealth for its shareholders while leaving its “owners” mired in poverty and underdevelopment.

The Department of Mineral Resources and the Government, incorporated into the structural benefits of the status quo, have been unable to chart a path out of and beyond the strictures of the most powerful lobby and the most entrenched vested interests. Instead from its early progressive vision of a transformed mining sector that would benefit the people as a whole, the state has reverted instead to the colonial protection of big mining and has all but abandoned the hope of fighting for and implementing structural changes that would benefit the society as a whole.

As far back as 1998, government released its White Paper on Minerals and Mining Policy, where it dedicated an entire section to policy statements meant to encourage and facilitate the development of the small-scale mining. Yet legislation setting out guidelines for regulating the mining industry, the Mineral and Resources Petroleum Act (MPRDA) of 2002, focuses mainly on Large Scale Mining (LSM), with a few exceptions. Section 27 describes a permitting process for allowing small-scale mining; yet, this process is extremely onerous as it requires submitting technical applications and environmental management plans, which may not be possible for small-scale miners, and certainly out of reach of artisanal miners.

While a Directorate of Small-Scale Mining exists to promote development of the sector and provide support to artisanal and small-scale miners (ASM), in practice, these miners are often criminalized. Mining operations conducted outside of the complex legal framework has been criminalized by the legislation, without addressing how to bring informal miners into the formal sector.

In November of 2009 the Portfolio Committee on Mineral Resources conducted public hearings to investigate the deaths of 86 informal miners at Harmony Gold’s mine.   The report highlighted extensive organized criminal activity, such as beatings of employees by informal miners and organized syndicates with kingpins.  Submissions also included negative societal impacts on surrounding communities as a result of mining houses failing to meet their social, safety and environmental obligations.  The recommendations that followed these public hearings included legislative reform only dealing with the illegal miners and included ways to increase penalties against them.

With over 6000 abandoned mines across South Africa and more than 1000 active mines around which communities living in poverty are excluded from sharing in the bounty of their land, the challenge and lure of artisanal and small scale mining will only grow.

South Africa faces a huge challenge of structural unemployment. The mining Industry has shed over a half a million jobs in the last 15 to 20 years and all indications are that this trend will continue. We literally have a half a million unemployed miners, walking the streets.

ASM`s, if brought under the legal protection and regulation of the state, offers not only an end to the lawlessness of zama-zama mining and the curtailment of the crime syndicates which benefit from it, but also offers the chance for creating jobs at a grand scale while reducing the environmental impacts of uncontrolled small scale and artisanal mining.

But first we have to overcome the colonial legacy which prefers large scale mining which only benefits a small elite and reorient our policy towards the inclusion of communities, small scale and artisanal mining, which creates employment, empowerment,  environmental sustainability and allows the state and community to benefit from the R6billion rand that the zama-zama`s mine every year.

To do this we need not reinvent the wheel. Small-scale mining provides about 1,1m jobs in Ghana and produces about a fifth of the country's gold. In Tanzania, small scale and artisanal mining provides close to 1,5m Jobs and accounts for over 10% of the countries gold production. These examples are not best practise exemplifiers, but they do give us an idea of the scale that either the problem can grow to, or of the scale that the solution can provide.

Despite the lack of progress in regulating this sector, mainly due to opposition from the current elites who benefit from the system as it is, many lessons have been learnt and success factors must include the following:

1.       Legitimise the artisanal and small scale mining sector: Create easy and uncomplicated methods to register ASM`s while ensuring that property rights are adjusted to ensure that In economic terms, there is an incentive to invest time and effort in a piece of land. Where there is unlimited access to a resource, there will be no concern of individuals to use it in a sustainable manner, and inefficient overuse and exploitation will result. Establish a legitimate small scale market for the purchase and sale of minerals and the hazardous chemicals used in the mining process.

2.       Build Capacity: This includes developing government`s ability to deal with the sector, but more importantly it should include organising the ASM miners so that they can organise themselves more productively, participate in the community and invite the community to participate in building sustainable livelihood opportunities for the entire community. The organisation of the ASM`s also simplifies negotiations, registration, training and monitoring.

3.       Promote Diversification: through education and support, both financial and practical, to develop alternative skills in downstream and upstream industries to create alternative employment opportunities. Develop community skills in rehabilitation of abandoned mines and in the development of campaigns such as the 1million climate jobs campaign.

4.       Improve collaboration between Large Scale Miners and Small Scale Miners: Ensure that LSM`s are required to share land and resources with communities in such a way that develops skills, jobs and creates wealth for the community. LSM`s must be required to work with ASM`s to come to a formal agreement to cohabitate and share the resource.  This process should involve support by LSM`s and government to fully legalize and formalize ASM activities.

The challenge before us requires an inclusive solution. Government`s response continues to be one dimensional. Its solutions are predicated only on the status quo and creating more “efficient” versions of the status quo.  The Phakisa project, and the amendments to the MPRDA which is still stuck in Parliament, seeks only to speed up the extraction of minerals and the exploitation of our resources without considering the lasting inequality of the structural legacy of mining. The only winners will be the usual suspects leaving the underlying problems to smoulder, always ready, at the slightest spark, to ignite into the next tragedy.

Denial of our structural legacy must certainly come face to face with reality as we are seeing in the mining sector today. Our sinking Titanic needs a captain who can see the icebergs and take action to avoid them, not one who sees the iceberg and ploughs straight ahead in the hope that the iceberg will move.