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Volume 3 / Issue 01 P35.00 JANUARY - MARCH 2020

Botswana set to conclude deal with De Beers by April 10

Funders jostle for Botswana coal 17

Next-generation technology delivers blasting for Africa 25

Diamond mining grows beyond Debswana

3 www.botswanamininreview.com Botswana Mining Review | January - March 2020

Contents Editorial Comment

Utilise the vast coal ‘black diamond’ resource : ...................... 4

Briefs : ...................... 5 Cover Story

Diamond mining grows beyond Debswana : ...................... 6

General News

Botswana ranked the most attractive destination for mining investors in Africa : ...................... 7Botswana seeks to exploit coal without adding to carbon footprint : ...................... 9Botswana set to conclude deal with De Beers by April : ...................... 10Coal is not going anywhere : ...................... 12-13Debswana production softens to 23.3m carats : ...................... 14Debswana hopes to increase its production this year : ...................... 15 Diamonds, Soda ash main contributors to negative index of mining production : ...................... 16Funders jostle for Botswana coal : ...................... 17Gov’t contemplates buying into Karowe : ...................... 18Kavango enters the Kalahari Copperbelt fray : ...................... 19Botswana has Coal potential-Minergy Group : ...................... 20 Industry Trends & Technologies

Digital technologies deliver tailings dam risk management systems : ...................... 21New Film Details How Botswana Benefits From Diamonds : ...................... 22-23Next-generation technology delivers blasting for Africa : ...................... 25Siemens leads the way in technology solutions in the mining sector : ...................... 26

Regional News

Africa Mining Forum to connect projects with financiers in Kigali : ...................... 27Safdico, Lucapa partnership inspires confidence within the sector : ...................... 27An Africa without waste: how gold mining is going green : ...................... 28US-China deal raises hopes for African mining sector : ...................... 29-30

PublisherEvans Mumba

General ManagerArnold Chinyemba

EditorBheki Fayayo

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Associate EditorUlla_Setswalo

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Editorial ContributionsTsepang Mohlabane

Kotso RametsiMartin SibandaJeffrey Kgathi

Advertising Sales Noah Maposa

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Utilise the vast coal ‘black diamond’ resource

espite global warming fears, the local mining industry should utilise the vast coal resource for both ex-port and power generation.

Statistics indicate that coal still make 41 percent of the electricity generation, while renewable energy will only occupy 21 per-cent of world generation by 2030.

With over 200 billion tonnes of coal, yet to be mined, the coal mining industry should soar and spur the country’s efforts to diver-sify exports.

Authorities have already indicated that the local economy should be export led and why not coal to lead the pack of planned and proposed exports, replacing the top export commodity diamonds.

D

In addition, it is pleasing to hear govern-ment announce that ways, in which coal can be mined without adding to the carbon footprint, are being discussed. Indeed such is a positive dialogue and an encouraging blueprint should be drafted.

The intentions to cut harmful emissions, through establishing a coal-to-liquid (CTL) refinery set by 2025 should be implemented and not become another talk show.

According to government, the CTL would be fast-tracked and it is pleasing to note that already the authorities have held pre-liminary discussions with Sasol, a recog-nized leader in CTL technology and whose Secunda refinery currently supplies South Africa with millions of litres of synthetic fuel each year.

Benchmarking from the best, should enable the nation to benefit and improve on what-ever have been challenges at the Secunda refinery.

The commitment government is exhibiting should not remain a one man show but should also attract the private sector play-ers to our shores to inject the much needed foreign direct investment (FDI).

The local economy has already been rec-ognised as a preferential destination for investment and we can only implore the authorities to do more to attract those with deep pockets, to finance various mining

projects. A lot of positive exploration results have been achieved.It therefore requires continued and concerted effort for much more to be achieved.

Send us your comments, inquiries and suggestions to [email protected]


Gemfields Group Ltd Lists on the London Stock Exchange

Gemfields Group Limited (“Gemfields”), the company that owns the Kagem emer-ald mine in Zambia, in partnership with the Zambian government, listed its shares on the AIM market of the London Stock Ex-change (LSE) on 14 February 2020.

The listing is the latest demonstration of Gemfields’ ethos of transparency, legiti-macy and integrity, enabling a wider reach of international investors to take a direct stake in Gemfields, which owns 75% of the Kagem emerald concession in Lufwanya-ma, with 25% owned by the government through the Industrial Development Corpo-ration (IDC).

Gemfields CEO Sean Gilbertson said: “The admission to the London market is an im-portant milestone for Gemfields after a de-cade of growth in the demand and prices for precious coloured gemstones. The AIM listing seeks to provide UK, European and international investors with more expedient entry into the precious coloured gemstone market, to improve share trading liquidity and to widen Gemfields’ current investor base. Our team looks forward immensely to this next phase in Gemfields’ development and to delivering value for all our stakehold-ers.”

Gemfields has maintained its primary list-ing on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE).

IIA Technologies infringed element six synthetic diamond rights

Singapore courts have ruled that IIa Tech-nologies have infringed an Element Six pat-ent for proprietary synthetic diamond prod-

Briefs

ucts and their method of manufacture.

The patent relates to the production of material which is desirable both for use in laboratory-grown diamond jewellery, and in optical applications such as infrared spec-troscopy and high-power laser optics.

Element Six has invested hundreds of mil-lions of dollars over more than 60 years to become a leading producer of synthetic di-amond material, developing new material to tackle some of science and industry’s most intractable challenges.

Any use of Element Six patents, without its consent, negatively impacts its ability to get a full return from its investment and under-mines its ability to carry out further import-ant research and development.

“This decision confirms the validity of our patent for the production of CVD synthetic diamonds, and we hold similar patents in many jurisdictions.

“We will continue to be vigilant for any oth-er potential infringement of our IP rights around the globe, and we will defend our rights vigorously – just as any company would – because protecting our ability to get a full return on our investment in R&D is vital to our future,” Walter Hühn, Chief Ex-ecutive of Element Six said.

Element Six produces synthetic diamonds for Lightbox Jewelry, and for a range of in-dustrial and technological applications such as in drilling and mining, the automotive and aerospace sectors, optics, consumer elec-tronics and even next generation applica-tions such as quantum enabled sensors.

JV kick start work at Lofdal Heavy Rare Earths in Namibia

Namibia Critical Metals Inc has announced details of the planned work program for the Lofdal Heavy Rare Earths Project.

The development comes after the company entered into an agreement with Japan Oil, Gas and Metals National Corporation (JOG-MEC) to jointly explore and develop Lofdal. Authorities at the company plan to com-plete a 7,700 m drill program at Area 4 with the objective to double the current mineral resource and deliver an updated NI43-101 report.

In addition, complete 1,500 meters of ex-ploration drilling on two priority satellite deposit targets and undertake further met-allurgical test work on sorting, magnet-ic separation, flotation and gangue acid leaching to refine the process flow sheet.

The company highlighted the $3,000,000 program will be undertaken from February 2020 to March 2021 and will be sole funded pursuant to a firm non-refundable commit-ment by JOGMEC.

On concluding the programme, JOGMEC has the right to earn a 40 percent inter-est in the project by funding an additional $7,000,000 in exploration expenditures and may earn an additional 10 percent interest by funding an additional $10,000,000 in ex-ploration expenditures.

The Lofdal Heavy Rare Earths Project is lo-cated 450 kilometers northwest of the cap-ital city of Windhoek in the Kunene Region of north-western Namibia. And the project area covers 314 square kilometers centered on the Lofdal carbonatite complex which hosts a number of rare earth occurrences, including the Area 4 deposit.

Utilise the vast coal ‘black diamond’ resource


or years Botswana diamonds’ household name has been Debswana before the emerging of other junior miners.

Over the past decade, the footprint of di-amond mining in the country has spread wings, as the new diamond mining outfits share the limelight, though still far from producing numbers above the giant miner Debswana.

Lucara Diamonds operating Karowe Mine is one such entity that continues to grab the headlines for its astonishing discoveries.

The discoveries include special single dia-monds in excess of 10.8 carats from direct milling ore with 786 stones totaling 24,424 carats recovered, including 31 diamonds in excess of 100 carats, of which 2 stones were in excess of 300 carats including the historic 1,758ct Sewelô diamond.

Furthermore, specials were also recovered in treatment of historic, pre-XRT recovery tailings, including a 375 carat stone in Q3 2019.

Apart from astounding unearthing, the com-pany has also embraced latest technolo-gies in its operations, from the beginning of its processes to the end of the value chain.Lucara’s value chain ends with a digital sales platform dubbed Clara platform, es-tablished in December 2018 and has helped the company spur her sales.

“The focus in 2019 was to increase the fre-quency of diamond sales and the number of customers regularly purchasing through the platform.

“As of December 31, 2019, the customer base had increased to 27 participants, with total sales volumes of $8.4 million from 15

Diamond mining grows beyond Debswana

F

sales on the platform, predominately from the sale of Karowe goods,” said Eira Thom-as, President and Chief Executive Officer of Lucara.

Thomas highlighted that further growth is expected through 2020 as more supply is made available through the platform, bal-anced with demand from the customer base.

“Third-party supply will complement the diamonds from Karowe which are sold through the platform and will support in-creased transaction volumes through 2020,” he added.

Thomas further indicated that between De-cember 2018 and February 2020, Clara’s customer base grew to 32 and total sales volumes of approximately $11.0 million had been transacted from 19 sales on the plat-form.

Though Lucara acknowledges that dia-monds are heterogeneous by nature, with thousands of different price points depend-ing on weight, colour, shape, and quality, di-amond production from Karowe is charac-terised by a coarse diamond size frequency distribution and is positively impacted by the regular recovery of diamonds in excess of 10.8 carats in size, referred to as ‘spe-cials’.

Karowe production is further distinguished by the consistent recovery of high value, gem quality specials.

The specials are reported by total stone count and as a percentage of the total pro-duction. In 2019, a total of 786 stones were recovered representing 6.1 weight percent of total carats recovered from direct milling

ore, consistent with the resource model for Karowe. “In 2019, a total of 30 individual di-amonds were sold for a value of $1 million including 11 diamonds $2 million of which 2 diamonds sold for $5 million each.

“Sales of individual stones at prices be-tween $2 million and $5 million were con-sistent with previous years. Achieved prices in 2019 for high value single diamonds were impacted by significant price erosion in high colour (D) 10 carat and 20 carat polished,” Thomas said.

Meanwhile Lucara’s updates indicates that in 2018, the company embarked on a tech-nical program to support a feasibility level study for a potential underground operation at the Karowe Diamond Mine.

The program included the completion of an updated mineral resource, geotechnical drilling of the country rock and AK06 kim-berlite, hydrogeological drilling and model-ling, and mining trade off studies to address risks and issues identified during the PEA.

As a result a total of $21.0 million was spent in 2018 in support of this work, which re-sulted in significant de-risking of the key technical components associated with the potential underground development.

During 2019, $13.4 million ($14.8 million - 2019 budget) was spent on the completion of a geotechnical drilling program, geo-technical and geological logging, downhole geophysical survey, hyperspectral analysis of core, geotechnical modeling, hydrogeo-logical drilling and studies, mine planning, engineering, and activities related to dewa-tering associated with underground prepa-rations.

Cover Story


and Merchant Bank’s ‘Where to Invest in Africa’ survey has ranked Botswana as the most attractive destination for mining investors in Africa.

These findings are largely based on the Fra-ser Institute Annual Survey of Mining Com-panies, which Botswana regularly tops.

“Botswana ranks the highest due to politi-cal stability and security, low trade barriers, and investor certainty regarding protected areas,” the RMB report notes.

“It is crucial to combine the value of the mining sector with the regulatory environ-ment to assess which jurisdictions are the most attractive for investment.

“As an example, the DRC shows strength in its mining industry value growth, however, the country’s mining sector still battles with stringent and unpredictable regulations.

“Botswana again made the top ranking for Africa (in the Fraser survey) due to its vast mineral deposits as well as an easy regula-tory environment.”

Botswana ranked the most attractive destination for mining investors in Africa

R In the same survey, Botswana was again ranked Africa’s 13th most attractive desti-nation for investment.

The annual survey covers Africa’s 54 coun-tries and primarily ranks them according to economic activity, looking at market size and growth, as well as the business envi-ronment.

The authoritative report is a key instrument used mainly by investors looking to guide their decisions, but also by policymakers and governments to gauge themselves and their peers.

The latest survey, made available outside RMB’s client list for the first time, shows that while Botswana topped the list in its at-tractiveness to mining, the country’s rank-ing on the overall list remains unchanged from last year.

Botswana also climbed up the list of coun-tries with the best operating environment, jumping three spots in the annual RMB sur-vey and coming third after Mauritius and Rwanda.

“The operating environment is a vital com-ponent of an investment case as it balances the quantitative macroeconomic view with the practicalities of doing business,” the RMB report reads.

“Of the top 10 operating environments, four are located in Southern Africa, once again bearing testament to the importance of well-developed infrastructure, a healthy and well-educated workforce, an efficient goods market and strong institutions.”

Botswana’s shortcomings, however, in-clude poor work ethic in the national labour force, which was cited as the single biggest disincentive for investors. Generally, the top challenges in Africa include access to financing, corruption, tax rates, inefficient government bureaucracy and inadequate supply of infrastructure.

Overall, RMB ranked Egypt, Morocco and South Africa as Africa’s top three countries to invest in, while Burundi, Somalia and Equatorial Guinea were the bottom three respectively.

General News


otswana’s Minister of Mineral Resources Lefoko Maxwell Moagi has revealed that Botswa-na is exploring ways in which it can exploit its coal without adding to the carbon foot-print.

The country has some of Africa’s largest coal reserves (estimated at 212 billion)de-scribed by Moagi as “God’s gift”.

The country wants to exploit them while cutting harmful emissions hence its com-mitment in establishing coal-to-liquid (CTL) refinery set to come on stream by 2025.

According to the minister, the CTL project, and the 100-megawatt pilot coal bed meth-ane project, are two projects Botswana would fast-track.

“We believe coal has also got a beneficial way of being exploited without adding to the carbon footprint. We can convert it in coal-to-liquids, we can convert it to gas, we can do a lot of things with coal and these are the things we will be exploiting fully,” Moagi said.

Botswana seeks to exploit coal without adding to carbon footprint

B State-owned firm Botswana Oil (BOL) is-sued a tender three years ago seeking in-vestors to build the plant, estimated then to cost around $4 billion, as the diamond-rich southern African country seeks to secure its energy supplies.

“It (CTL plant) is still in its infancy stage, but we believe now it will be accelerated,” Lefoko Maxwell Moagi, minister of mineral resources, green technology and energy security, told Reuters on the sidelines of the Mining Indaba investment conference in Cape Town.

Asked about funding challenges for any fu-ture coal-related projects amidst a global pushback from banks and investors, Moagi said some banks, which he did not name, as well as Chinese firms, remained potential financiers.

Moagi said the government had held pre-liminary discussions with Sasol, a recog-nized leader in CTL technology and whose Secunda refinery currently supplies South Africa with millions of litres of synthetic fuel each year.

Sasol did not immediately respond for com-ment.

Last year, Shumba Energy formed a joint venture with two Chinese companies to build a separate coal-to-liquids plant at a cost of between $1.5 billion and $2 billion.

Moagi said the government also expected to finalize power purchase agreements this year for a planned new 100MW pilot power plant using coal bed methane, gas trapped in underground coal seams.

Tlou Energy and Sekaname, a subsidiary of Kalahari Energy, have been shortlisted to develop the project.

“The project is at an advanced stage be-cause what we needed to do is to make sure the power purchase agreements are finalised and we hope that this year it will be finalised,” Moagi said.

He said the government expected the coal bed methane project to come onstream by 2022.

General News


otswana, in its negotiation with De Beers, is advocating for more gems to be cut and polished in the country so as to boost its revenue.

These are part of the submissions the country has put forward in their current negotiations with British Mining Company.

Botswana hopes to conclude negotiations with De Beers on a di-amond sales agreement by the end of April to replace the current ten-year deal that expires in January 2021.

The 2011 agreement concluded on the relocation of De Beers’ site and operations – professional, skills, equipment and technology – from London to Gaborone by 2013.

But according to the country’s Minister of Mineral Resources, Green Technology and Energy Security, Lefoko Moagi, the govern-ment is seeking more access to the processing of the gemstone with this new deal.

Lefoko Moagi said, “We now want further to move into the value space; the bottom end of the business which involves your valu-ation, your pricing, cutting and polishing, marketing, selling, jew-ellery making.” He added that the country is “looking at April, not beyond, for all of this to happen and be successfully concluded.”

Emphasising the need for job creation and human capital devel-opment, a statement by the minister reads, “What more really we need is to see jobs coming through, we want to see young people

Botswana set to conclude deal with De Beers by April

B participating in these jobs.”

De Beers, expressing their commitment to the cause in Botswana, said they are “fully focused on continuing to be a dedicated part-ner to the people of Botswana, and to delivering” on their commit-ments.

Botswana already owns 15% of De Beers and has a 50% stake in the Debswana mining company. As part of the existing agreement, De Beers moved diamond sales to Botswana from London, and the government secured the right to sell 10% of Debswana’s produc-tion independently.

Although the country has recorded much success on economic growth in the past 3 years chiefly as a result of good resource man-agement, the gap between what it makes from polished stones in comparison to the rough stones is wide.

As of 2018, it made $846 million on the export of polished gems exported whereas the value of the rough stones involved in the pro-cess was worth $5.1 billion.

This may account for why wants to derive as much benefit as pos-sible from its mineral resources.

It is important for both parties to come to a compromise by April. Botswana accounts for more than two-thirds of De Beers’ produc-tion, it also depends heavily on these gems processed by De Beers for foreign earnings.

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he coal sector is living under the constant threat of being blamed by environmentalists as being responsible for a world disaster called glob-al warming.

Cliques are telling industry and government to change and adopt the ‘new energy econ-omy’ or as America’s infamous politician and activist Alexandra Ocasio Cortez calls it, ‘The New Energy Deal’.

She states that the only solution to avoid devastation to the world is to accept that renewable energy is the way to go for all energy needs, given that it is becoming so cheap, and so fast that the move to a world that no longer needs oil, natural gas, or coal is unavoidable.

The industry’s answer is, as Lars Schernikau puts in:

• Coal’s importance will further increase in absolute and relative terms for decades to come• Man-made CO₂ has no effect on global temperatures and combustion of fossil fuels does not influence the weather• We cannot stop the advance of coal; we

Coal is not going anywhere By Xavier Prévost, senior coal analyst at XMP Consulting

T can only make this process as environmen-tally sustainable as humanly possible

The Massachusetts Institute for Technology (MIT) in “The Future of Coal” 2007 states:

“Coal is likely to remain an important source of energy in any conceivable future energy scenario. Accordingly, our priority actions are to reduce the CO₂ emissions that coal use produces.”

We strongly believe that it is still sustainable as part of South Africa’s energy mix. Con-trary to the idea that ‘coal is dead’, South African reserves and resources are abun-dant and can provide low-emitting, cost-ef-fective, reliable and sustainable power well into the future, using Clean Coal technolo-gies (CCTs).

Coal mining, power generation, industrial utilisation and allied industries provide more than 700 000 jobs and this figure should in-crease as more mines and industries open in the future.

It is well recognised that seven times that number is the approximate quantity of de-pendents on average allied to every person

in employment.

One further fact not understood by the pub-lic is that, for every mine or industry job, many more jobs are created in support in-dustries. This includes transport services, retail shopping complexes, schools, hospi-tals, and building-related activities.

For these reasons, coal is the mainstay of our economy. If mines, for example, were to be closed, or become unproductive, many jobs would be lost, increasing unemploy-ment and poverty. Coal supplies 95% of the electricity consumed by the country. Elec-tricity from coal is still the cheapest in the world.

Because of the current lack of incentives and funds to implement new projects in the country, production is not growing and be-cause some of the large, older mine’s out-put is decreasing, our yearly production has not improved for years.

The reality is that the 2020 ‘Coal Cliff’ is here! Some banks do not fund power sta-tions, but funding for mining is still available.Coal prices, drivers of a successful industry, have regularly increased in the local market,

General News


where some grades now show higher pric-es than similar grades in the export market. Mines are also currently selling more to that market, although the future of Eskom is still uncertain.

Despite Eskom and the renewables indus-try assertions that they should be used in power generation, we know that, as in the EU, it can only happen at great peril to the economy, so the demand for coal remains.

In countries such as China and India, use is growing, because there have no alter-natives. A technological new solution will hopefully be found, but it is not here yet.

I am confident about the future of the in-dustry. As Reuters Refinitiv declares in the article:

“Coal may be dying, but growth in the sea-borne market says not yet”; it is a bit of a surprise to look at the actual volume of coal being shipped around the globe and see that it is growing so far this year.

In the first seven months of 2019 a total of 870.8 Mt of coal, thermal and coking, was imported from the seaborne market, ac-cording to vessel-tracking and port data compiled by Refinitiv.

That’s 2.1% higher than the 852.6 Mt in the same period in 2018. This is not a massive increase, but the fact that the seaborne

market is stronger in 2019 does challenge the narrative of a dying industry.

The overall picture for seaborne coal does remain gloomy, but as the growth in the market so far this year shows, coal remains sticky in the global energy system and any death may be lingering.

The local industry will, for many years to come, will be a reliable supplier of cheap inland energy and a large source of profit for big and small producers.

The DMRE 2018 production statistics showed that of the five main commodi-ties; coal, gold, PGMs, diamonds and iron ore, coal was the highest value earner with R145.6 billion (37.5% of the total).

Observing current seaborne and inland coal prices, sizes and qualities available to the markets, let us try to provide an illustration of the status of coal supply and a foretaste of future developments.

Before 2009, inland market prices increased at approximately 10% per annum. From 2011 to 2015 by 8% and then again by 5% from 2016 to 2018.

As transport plays a big role, with logistics and fuel costs ever-growing, mines closer to market have had an advantage when de-termining delivered price to end-users. Coal exports, once best money-makers, are now

in decline and cannot expect to support the industry as in years past.

In the seaborne market, steam coal prices fluctuate extensively, mainly due to the in-fluence of China. The markets for exports’ displaced tonnages are new developments in NE Asian countries.

Trade to the Pacific, eastern Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean will grow, while ex-ports to Europe will be replaced by growth in exports to India, Latin America and other small markets.

Exports in the future will be dominated by low-cost mined coal. Minimum contractual tonnages and sunk costs in rail, barge and terminal will promote exports at very mar-ginal profit levels.

The future shows substantial growth in pric-es and tonnages in the inland market, while export prices will remain static or decrease. This will generate an almost price equiva-lence between inland and export, resulting in the accelerated growth of the local mar-ket at the expense of exports.

The message for the industry is that to cope with an expanding local demand and higher future prices, our coal production which has been sluggish since 2013, requires more capital and the implementation of new proj-ects and mines as soon as possible. If this does not happen and soon, alternative im-ports from new Botswana’s mines will reap the benefits.

About the authorBorn in La Paz, Bolivia, Xavier Prévost ob-tained an M.Sc degree in Engineering Geolo-gy from the University Of San Andres in 1968, a Diploma in Mining and Exploration from the Montanistische Hochschule in Austria, a Graduate Diploma in Engineering from Wits’ Leadership in Coal Technology Programme and an M. Engineering degree from Wits in 2002.


ebswana produced 23.3 million carats last year, marginally lower than its 24 million target, achieving the feat despite a slump in demand for the precious stones. Last year, global diamond giant, De Beers, which owns 50% of Debswana, cut the target for its operations worldwide to 31 million carats, from an initial forecast of up to 33 million carats.

De Beers has a policy of mining to demand and minimising stockpiles, a strategy adopted after the rough diamond de-mand collapse triggered by the global recession in 2009.

Debswana, however, said it would maintain its production guidance of 24 million carats and as such did not expect the slump to affect jobs at its four operating mines. Numbers re-leased by Anglo American, which holds 85% equity in De Beers, show that for 2019, Debswana produced 23.25 million carats out of De Beers’ total 30.78 million carat production.

De Beers’ total production was down from 35.30 million car-ats in 2018, the reductions mainly attributable to operations in South Africa, Namibia and Canada. Debswana produced 24.13 million carats in 2018 and 22.68 million carats in 2017.

Debswana’s quarterly production in 2019 generally matched 2018’s before a seven percent drop in the fourth quarter. “Bo-tswana production decreased by seven percent to 5.9 million carats in the fourth quarter,” a production update from Anglo reads.

“Orapa production decreased by 29%, caused by a delay in an infrastructure project and expected lower grades. “This was partially offset by a 21% increase at Jwaneng driven by planned increases in both tonnes treated and grade.” De Beers expects to produce between 32 and 34 million carats this year, most of that from Debswana. The forecast is based on an improvement in trading conditions.

Debswana production softens to 23.3m carats

D

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ebswana Diamond Company has revealed that it hopes to increase its production to between 32 and 34 carats this year.

Last year it produced 23.3 million carats, marginally lower than its 24 million target.

The diamond company achieved this feat despite a slump in de-mand for the precious stones.

“Orapa production decreased by 29%, caused by a delay in an in-frastructure project and expected lower grades.

“This was partially offset by a 21% increase at Jwaneng driven by planned increases in both tonnes treated and grade.

De Beers expects to produce between 32 and 34 million carats this year, most of that from Debswana. The forecast is based on an im-provement in trading conditions,” a production update from Anglo reads.

Last year, global diamond giant, De Beers, which owns 50% of Debswana, cut the target for its operations worldwide to 31 million carats, from an initial forecast of up to 33 million carats.

Debswana hopes to increase its production this year

D De Beers has a policy of mining to demand and minimising stock-piles, a strategy adopted after the rough diamond demand collapse triggered by the global recession in 2009.

Debswana, however, said it would maintain its production guidance of 24 million carats and as such did not expect the slump to affect jobs at its four operating mines.

Numbers released by Anglo American, which holds 85% equity in De Beers, show that for 2019, Debswana produced 23.25 million carats out of De Beers’ total 30.78 million carat production.

De Beers’ total production was down from 35.30 million carats in 2018, the reductions mainly attributable to operations in South Afri-ca, Namibia and Canada.

Debswana produced 24.13 million carats in 2018 and 22.68 million carats in 2017.

Debswana’s quarterly production in 2019 generally matched 2018’s before a seven per cent drop in the fourth quarter. “Botswana pro-duction decreased by seven per cent to 5.9 million carats in the fourth quarter,” reads the statement.

General News


tatistics Botswana has revealed that year-on-year growth rates in the third quarter of 2019 have seen diamonds and soda ash being the main contributors to the negative growth of the Index of Mining Production (IMP).

According to Statistics Botswana, dia-monds contributed a negative 0.7 while soda ash contributed 0.4 of a percentage point.

This also happens to be Botswana’s worst decline of its diamond production in seven years.

Statistics Botswana, which is mandated to compile data on industrial production in Botswana, hence index of mining produc-tion is only confined to minerals extracted across the country, explained that it moni-tored the performance of the mining sector in Botswana.

In his latest report, statistician general, Dr Burton Mguni, explained that the report, which uses 2013 as a reference year with data sourced from the Department of Mines under the Ministry of Mineral Resources, Green Technology and Energy Security, shows that IMP stood at 85.6 during the third quarter of 2019, showing a year-on-year decrease of 1.8 per cent from the index of 87.1 recorded during the third quarter of 2018.

Mguni said the Indices Mining Production stood at 85.6 during the third quarter of 2019, showing a year-on-year decrease of 1.8 per cent from 87.1 during the third quar-ter of 2018.

“It is worth noting that all minerals have registered negative year-on-year growth rates in the third quarter of 2019, as a result of unstable commodity prices. Diamonds and soda ash were the main contributors to the negative growth of the index of min-

Diamonds, Soda ash main contributors to negative index of mining production

S ing production, having contributed nega-tive 0.7 and negative 0.4 of a percentage point respectively,” said Mguni. The quar-ter-on-quarter analysis shows a decrease of 0.4 per cent, from the index of 85.9 during the second quarter of 2019 to 85.6 ob-served during the reference period.

Comparison on a quarter-on-quarter basis shows a decrease of 0.4 per cent, from the index of 85.9 realised during the second quarter of 2019 to 85.6 registered during the third quarter of 2019.

The report presents quarterly IMP for the period 2012 to the third quarter of 2019. Also carried in the report are the annual IMP for the period 2012 to 2018, derived as the average of the four quarters of the year.

Mguni’s report further shows the contribu-tion of each mineral and mineral group to the Year-on-Year Percentage Change in the Volume of Mining Production, and hence reflects the trend in the local mining sector.He said diamond production decreased by 0.7 per cent during the third quarter of 2019 compared to the same quarter of the pre-vious year.

“Although diamond production dropped, it is important to note that the decline result-ed mainly from planned strategy to reduce bulky production to align production with trading conditions,” said Mguni.

He said even though there was a decline in production between the third and second quarters of 2019, there was a sign of im-provement as the current decrease was at a reduced percentage of 0.7 compared to the 4.2 per cent fall between the first two quarters of the same year.

Gold production declined by 1.0 per cent during the third quarter of 2019 compared to the same quarter in 2018. The quar-ter-on-quarter analysis reflects a decrease

of 2.9 per cent during the third quarter of 2019 compared to the second quarter of 2019. This decline was as a result of lower than expected gold recoveries from the ore.Soda ash production decreased by 20.5 per cent during the third quarter of 2019, com-pared to the same quarter of the previous year. The decrease in production can be attributable to the inefficiency of the plant to operate at full capacity during the year. On the other hand, the quarter-on-quarter analysis shows that production increased by 49.2 per cent during the period under review.

Mguni further explained that the increase was a result of the need for stockpiling to avoid commodity shortfalls that may be re-alised during the shutdown period

Salt production declined by 17.2 per cent during the third quarter of 2019 compared to the same quarter in 2018. The quar-ter-on-quarter comparison shows a decline of 0.2 per cent during the third quarter of 2019 compared to the preceding quarter.Coal production dropped by 28.6 per cent during the third quarter of 2019 compared to production registered during the same quarter of the previous year. The decline was mainly as a result of low uptake by Morupule B Power station which has re-sumed remedial works on the boilers.

Although production fell, there was no shortfall in supply of coal due to stockpil-ing undertaken during the previous months. The quarter-on-quarter comparison, like-wise, reflects a decrease of 23.5 per cent when compared to the preceding quar-ter. Copper-nickel-cobalt matte, copper in Concentrates and silver recorded zero pro-duction during the period under review. The instability and uncertainty of commodity prices affected production at the associat-ed mines, leading to provisional liquidation as mining operations could not be sus-tained at the current prices.

General News


t is reported that China, United States and Canada are among some of the funders that have expressed willingness to exploit Botswana’s coal resources.

According to Mineral Resources, Green Technology and Energy Security Minister, Lefoko Moagi, contact has been made and funders have responded well to Botswana’s plans for its coal resources.

It is understood Chinese players are amongst those interested in helping Bo-tswana exploit its coal resources, while the United States has also indicated its read-iness to partner. Canada has also resist-ed efforts to close the door on supporting coal and is instead focusing on supporting coal-transition efforts.

However, their investment in the project de-pends on how green the exploitation is.

“We very much would like to work with ev-eryone who wants cleaner, green technolo-gies, but we are saying ‘if you are not giving us an alternative to how we will generate our power, are you saying we must collapse as an economy because power runs every-thing’?

“If there’s no power, the country shuts down,” Moagi told BusinessWeek.

“There are banks which confirmed to us at the Indaba, commercial banks, that they are still looking into these coal projects, on the merits,” Moagi told BusinessWeek.

“They will look into how green we want to pursue the projects and they will consider financing them, based on the greening of the exploitation.

“Apart from banks, there are people awash with cash who want to participate and this is their space and their time.”

The minister told BusinessWeek bankers at the Mining Indaba, which ended last week in Cape Town, had responded well to Bo-tswana’s plans for its mammoth coal re-sources.

Worldwide, major project funders such as the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, African Development Bank as well as numerous large commercial banks have cut back or stopped financing new coal projects in line with global commitments on reducing carbon emissions.

In Botswana, government and other qua-si-government bodies such as the Botswa-na Development Corporation, have taken up the role of funding coal projects, as the

Funders jostle for Botswana coal

I country pushes ahead with unlocking the value of its massive resources.

He said some financiers were seeing op-portunity where others had left in the coal sector and would be willing to partner with local projects.

“I’m hoping that it’s a business opportunity for those who want to finance because they could even put a premium to this,” the min-ister told BusinessWeek.

“We don’t want them to go that route, but it is a business opportunity to say ‘look here is money and we can add a 0.5% for you to get funding’. “If it works for our country, I’m sure we would be prepared to do that.”

The country’s most advanced coal projects include Shumba Energy, which sits on a 4.5 billion tonnes resource while Minergy started activities at its Masama Mine last year and is ramping up to a target of 80,000 tonnes per month. Several other developers are at various advanced stages across coal-fields in the central and eastern districts.

Moagi said Botswana was devoted to its global climate change commitments and was rather pushing for innovation and re-search around cleaner fossil fuels.

He said the country was also making strides with the development and adoption of re-newable energy such as solar and coal bed methane, but these would not replace coal anytime soon. “We must exploit as much in-novation and research to make sure cleaner coal can be exploited. “There are technolo-gies currently and you need to improve on them to make sure more of it can be exploit-ed in a much cleaner fashion to reduce the carbon footprint and ensure we go green.

“Make no mistake, we all subscribe to a cleaner world and we are signatories to the protocols that have been signed, but we believe that we just can’t leave an abun-dance of a God-given resource like that.

“We need to exploit it cleaner for the benefit of our communities and nations.

“It is the same argument with nuclear power about how dangerous is it, but people have nuclear power everywhere and now they talk about coal.”

He added: “We believe these are transition times were as we narrow the fossil usage, building onto the renewables, we will go that route. “But if I look at the Vision 2036, we will not be completely out of fossils by that time, but there will be a significant part done by renewables.

“I also hope by that time, there will be lots of research that will have come out to make sure fossils are exploited in a much greener fashion.”

The Southern African Power Pool, a group-ing of regional power producers, is still largely based on the exploitation of coal with most new planned generation still around the fossil fuel, despite the paucity of funding.

General News


he Minerals Development Com- pany Botswana, government’s mining investment agency, is in-vestigating whether talks should be started with Lucara into acquiring a stake. Lucara’s Karowe keeps discovering headline-grab-bing diamonds, but the decision is anything but clear-cut.

Since its commissioning in 2012, Lucara’s Karowe Diamond Mine has fast built a reputation for finding some of the world’s most remarkable diamonds. From 2015’s 1,109-carat Lesedi la Rona and 813-car-at Constellation, to last year’s 1,758-carat Sewelo and the 549-carat gem announced last week, Karowe has regularly been in the global headlines.

From the beginning of the year-to-date in 2020, Karowe has produced six diamonds greater than 100 carats and appears well on the way to a revenue target of between $180 million and $210 million (between P1.97 billion to P2.3 billion).

Under the Mines and Minerals Act, govern-ment is entitled to make offers for equity stakes in mining companies and while it was initially content with royalties and tax-es from Karowe, the rising riches appear to have become too tempting to ignore.

Last year President Mokgweetsi Masisi re-vealed that he and other senior officials had held talks with Lucara executives during the Head of State’s trip to the US, where the

Gov’t contemplates buying into Karowe

T issue of securing a stake was discussed.

On Tuesday, Mineral Resources, Green Technology and Energy Security minister, Lefoko Moagi told Mmegi the Minerals Development Company Botswana, gov-ernment’s mining investment agency, was yet to return with recommendations on the idea.

Complicating the matter is that govern-ment’s focus at the moment is on its on-going negotiations with De Beers for a new sales agreement. The current deal is due to lapse next January.

“The time that we are talking about is pre-carious in the sense that we are still in ne-gotiations with our partner De Beers,” he said in an interview.“It is not about roughing anything in terms of existing relationships.

“All we are saying is that whilst there’s some process that is ongoing now, let that pro-cess conclude then we get onto other is-sues.

“Where we see value we always look at it and see how it will benefit Batswana.”

But does government regret not taking up equity in Lucara? Analysts believe the tim-ing is tricky. Lucara is thinking about going underground by 2026 and should govern-ment join its shareholders, it will have to contribute funds for this. Lucara has bud-

geted $53 million (P581m) for early works towards the underground project, this year alone. On the other hand, however, Lucara’s share price has gone down in recent times from a peak of P34 per share to the cur-rent level of P6.69 on the Botswana Stock Exchange. A lower valuation would be ide-al for government to enter the share regis-try. For Moagi, the answer to the question about regrets is not a simple yes or no.

“Where we see value we always look at it and see how it will benefit Batswana.

“At Lucara, these are technologies of re-covery whereby you use a mega-diamond recovery after the primary crusher. So it’s a question of that stone not being broken be-fore it gets to downstream processes.

“But also it’s a business decision that you take. When you look at Debswana, they are volume driven.

“Lucara is only doing about 300,000 car-ats tops right now, while Debswana we are talking 20 million.

“It’s also a question of ‘do I go this way or that way’.

“Currently, we enjoy the royalties and tax-es coming out of Lucara but it’s something that can be looked at.”

Source-Mmegi Online

General News


avango Resources believe that their two mining licences in Botswana allow them access to highly prospective Kalahari Copperbelt Area.

Michael Foster, Chief Executive Officer of Kavango explained that the signing of the deal represents an opportunity for his company to explore an excellent opportunity in an area he believes is under-explored.

“The signing of the joint venture agreement with LVR represents an excellent opportunity for Kavango to acquire an interest in some highly prospective ground in the Kalahari Copper Belt area, which is now regarded as one of the world’s most promising under-explored copper provinces,” he said.

Kavango Resources recently signed a joint venture agreement con-cerning two prospecting licences situated in the Botswana section of the Kalahari Copper Belt.

The joint venture agreement is with Botswana registered company LVR GeoExplorers (Pty) Ltd and provides a staged earn-in, which will give the company the right to earn up to a 90% interest in both or either of the prospecting licences.

Kavango enters the Kalahari Copperbelt fray

K The mining exploration firm said the first licence lies north of MOD Resources Ltd T3 mine development and is surrounded by MOD, Metal Tiger PLC and Sandfire Resources NL licences.

The other licence is close to the Namibian border south of the Trans-Kalahari highway and adjacent to a block of licences held by Kopore Metals Ltd.

Kavango shares were trading 13% lower in London at 1.20 pence each on Monday.

In the first 12 months following the signing of the agreement, Ka-vango will be obliged to spend GBP92,000 on each of the licences, to acquire a 25% interest.

The company’s interest in either of the prospects can be extended by further expenditure in 3 stages to earn a maximum of 90%.Kavango will be the managers of the exploration and development but will have the option to withdraw at any time following a two month notice period, the company said.

General News


hile coal producers and market players in Southern Africa are outlining risks and opportunities for the year ahead as more short-term contracts have been signed with Eskom, Minergy believes the Botswana po-tential has to be explored as it can solve some of the region’s industrial headaches.

Speaking during the IHS Markit Southern African Coal Conference in Cape Town, Minergy Group CEO, Morne du Plessis, ex-plained that opportunities could also come from Botswana in future.

He outlined the potential in Botswana, which he said was sitting on 200-billion tonnes of coal.

Minergy, which is listed on the Botswana Stock Exchange, is developing its 100% owned 390-million-tonne Matsama coal project in Botswana’s Mmamabula area. It hopes to be a key player in Southern Africa in coal mining and trading.

“We are close to our target markets, just 60 km north-east of Gaborone. We have consistent qualities of coal. We also have opportunities to go outside the domestic market.”

For landlocked Botswana, an exciting pros-pect is to export to South Africa. Botswana Railways has said it intends to start con-struction of a coal railway line, the Mmam-

Botswana has Coal potential-Minergy Group

W abula-Lephalale line in 2021. It would take several years to build.

“The link between South Africa and Bo-tswana in four years time will take a signifi-cant number of kilometres out of the trans-port loop and make Botswana coal more affordable,” said Du Plessis.

It would be a gateway to South African ports for the coal market and link Botswana mines to the Transnet Freight Rail network.“At the moment, there’s a lot of goodwill in Botswana from the Botswana Rail Agency which supports building a link. It would be a game-changer for Botswana. The memo-randum of understanding has been signed between governments and partners. At this stage, they are trying to raise funding.”

The Botswana government has appealed to prospective investors with an attractive set of features, including its politically stable economy, a strong currency and zero toler-ance for corruption.

In South Africa, business with Eskom has become much more complex, but Octagon Minerals Managing Director, Waheed Su-laiman, believes it should still be a key part of the market strategy of South Africa coal producers.Speaking at the same function, he said while there was an increase of 14.1% in the average coal price over the 2019 financial year, the average mix of volumes was simi-

lar to the previous year. Higher prices were mainly from short and medium-term con-tracts issued to new suppliers.

“Short-term contracts make up half of Es-kom’s spend. That is a warning sign for Es-kom and the industry because you need a sustainable procurement model for the in-dustry to survive,” he cautioned.

Eskom’s 2019 annual report indicated that 41 new coal contracts had been concluded since January 2018. This had boosted coal stock levels.

For several of the majors, the export market is becoming more attractive than in the past as producers have found other outlets for their low-grade coal.

“The majors are disinvesting. The profile of customers and the balance sheet are go-ing to look very different moving forward,” suggested Divyesh Kalan, CEO of Orevest Supply Chains and Advisory and business director at Makoya Group. He said South Africa needed to improve its logistics and streamline the rail network.

He said coal exports had been “stuck” at an average of 75-million tonnes over the past few years, mainly due to markets, weather issues and challenges experienced by Transnet. But it had the potential to im-prove.

General News


ining services partner Fraser Alexander is making quick headway in becoming a global partner to the mining industry through smart value add solutions in its fields of expertise which most recently includes tailings management (deposition and re-mining).

Fraser Alexander’s business strategy has evolved over recent times and today includes a firm focus and alignment with the fourth industrial revolution.

“We believe that there are great opportunities through digitalisa-tion within the mining sector. Within the company we are re-skilling and re-directing our workforce focus and are currently investing in higher-value technology-driven solutions,” states COO Lourens de Koning.

“We see the industry currently moving towards the use of major technologies across various stages of the mining value chain, in-cluding the use of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning, a growing adoption of Internet of Things (IoT), an increasing preva-lence of virtual reality and augmented reality solutions and the use of 3D mapping solutions, drones, smart wearables, 3D printing, robotics and wireless telecommunication.”

Digital technologies deliver tailings dam risk management systems

M While Fraser Alexander has implemented various digital technolo-gies since 2016 but is particularly proud of its more recent initiative – the development and implementation of its Technical and Oper-ational Risk Assessment System, TORAS.

TORAS has been developed over several years and started as a manual system to assist in the identification and monitoring of tail-ings operational risks. “As part of our digitalisation drive it was decided to digitise the system and incorporate additional features resulting in a revolutionary tailings dam risk management system, as commented by external reviewers,” De Koning explains.

The system now provides a platform for capturing and analysing critical tailings dam metrics. It incorporates industry best practice typically applicable to mine owners, although Fraser Alexander does not own any TSFs, but is useful for the company own internal risk assurance.

“Our TORAS system is revolutionary and provides for the highest level of senior management accountability, both at Fraser Alexan-der and our mining clients,” De Koning ends.

Industry Trends & Technologies


y nearly all accounts when it comes to the diamond industry, Botswana is a success story. Be-cause of diamonds, the landlocked, arid country of 2.3 million people moved from being one of the poorest countries in Africa to one of the most successful medium-sized economies with more than 80% of diamond profits staying within the country. Much of this income benefits citizens through free education, free healthcare, an expansion of local jobs in the diamond industry, and plan for a more diversified economic future.

This information and more is included in a 14-minute film about Botswana’s relation-ship with the diamond industry produced by Eco-Age, a “sustainability consultancy” that works with companies to help them adopt sustainable practices then partners with them to market these practices to a wider public. The company is founded by Livia Firth with most of its partnerships in the fashion industry. In the jewellery and watch industry Eco-Age is perhaps best-known for its partnership with the luxu-ry brand, Chopard, to produce an annual “Green Carpet” sustainable high jewellery collection and to help the company devel-op a system to acquire all of its gold from ethical sources.

The film, titled “Fashionscapes: The Dia-monds Of Botswana,” is billed as a doc-umentary, however it is perhaps better defined as a promotional film created in partnership with the government of Bo-

New Film Details How Botswana Benefits From Diamonds By Anthony DeMarco

B tswana and various players in the country’s diamond industry, including the De Beers Group and Lucara Botswana, a diamond mining company that specializes in un-earthing large diamonds.

It is directed by Andrew Morgan—best known for his documentary, “The True Cost,” which focuses on fast fashion and its detrimental impact on the people and environment in poorer countries—was un-veiled Wednesday in New York and is now available on the Eco-Age website. Its is part of a series of films that documents stories of positive sustainable practices around the world.

Interviews with Firth in the film are heavi-ly weighted toward local women who have achieved a great level of success because of the country’s diamond industry. They include Naseem Lahri, managing director of Lucara Botswana, the first Motswana female to run a diamond mining company in Botswana. Pat Dambe, VP of De Beers Group, Susanne Swaniker, CFO Global Sightholders Sales, De Beers Group, and Kgalalelo Mokgweetsi, a community liai-son with Lucara. One woman interviewed, Chandapiwa Monamati operates some of the world’s largest mining trucks in the Debswana Orapa diamond mine, jointly owned by De Beers and the government of Botswana.

Lahri, Dambe and Mokgweetsi, attended the event and participated in a panel dis-

cussion following the film with Firth and Morgan. The panel was moderated by Ali-na Cho, television correspondent and book publishing editor. There were personal sto-ries, community-driven stories and big pic-ture data shared during the discussion.

For example, Lahri showed her ring to the audience set with a diamond from Bostwa-na and described its significance. “When I wear this ring,” she says, “I’ve empowered a child. I’ve empowered a community and a country as a whole. I carry pride with me every time I wear a Botswana diamond.”

Mokgweetsi added, “A woman in the vil-lage will tell you that I’m going to school, I’m going to the hospital, I’m going to uni-versity, or I’m going to work because of the diamonds. I put food on the table because of the diamonds.”

Dambe described how Botswana’s pub-lic-private partnerships compare with oth-er countries. “We have $7.2 billion for a population of 2.2 million, the size of Texas. There’s not a single country that has that. We’re considered to be the number one in terms of transparency and lack of corrup-tion in the continent. We don’t have loans with the IMF or the World Bank. It’s all from one product.”

A good portion of the short film deals with how the country is working to diversify its economy, anticipating a time when mines will no longer produce diamonds. This ef-



fort is in the early stages and there are few concrete examples. However, the emphasis is that the country has the luxury of plan-ning for a more diverse future because of the wealth created by the diamond industry. To highlight this, Firth interviews locals in-cluding Mokgweetsi who manages a com-munity agricultural site that creates employ-ment and provides nutritious fresh food for poorer communities, a teacher in one of the country’s elementary schools, and a man who manages a wildlife preserve. All of the projects are supported by diamond industry earnings.

One of the highlights of the film is the showing of the 1,758-carat rough diamond named “Sewelô,” meaning “rare find” in the Botswana Tswana language. It is the sec-ond-largest rough diamond ever unearthed. It was found in the Karowe mine in Botswa-na, owned by Lucara. The diamond is jointly owned by Lucara, a diamond manufacturer named HB and Louis Vuitton, which will cre-ate a set of jewellery with it. It’s an unprece-dented partnership as rough diamonds are usually sold through dealers in the diamond trade before they are cut, polished and

used for jewels. The diamond’s value hasn’t been released and is largely unknown but, according to published reports, it will lack some of the gem-quality attributes of pur-er diamonds. One report estimates it in the low millions, a stark difference from the 1,111-carat diamond, called Lesedi La Rona, discovered in the same mine, which sold for $53 million to Graff.

However, the diamond is being promoted as a symbol of Botswana’s responsible use of its rich resources. The film appears to be part of this publicity push. The deal among Lucara, Louis Vuitton and HB was an-nounced in January. A long, detailed piece about Lucara and the diamond industry in Botswana by the New Yorker was published a few days ago.

Firth’s final interview in the film is with Bo-tswana President, Mokgweetsi Masisi, which he talks about how the government shares the profits from diamonds. “Ethics is critical, environmental stewardship is criti-cal, workers’ rights are critical and what you do with the proceeds of what you get is tell-ing of who you are and the values you hold.

We do have challenges, we admit them and we want to face them head-on.”

As the film ends, Firth says, “Coming to Botswana I was nervous that I would find the imbalance I have witnessed elsewhere. When a single industry generates wealth and has disproportionate power, it can be very dangerous. In Bangladesh and other fast fashion ‘hot spots,’ I have seen corpo-rations abuse their power over a dependent economy and cut and run without any real exit plan.”

Firth continues, “But here in Botswana, I’ve seen a picture of what can happen when businesses operate in partnership with government and civil society, making long-term investments in collaboration with local communities to ensure that the benefits are truly shared with those on the ground. I came here to look at a single supply chain. But as my visit ends I wonder if Botswana wondering if this country represents some-thing even bigger – a new vision for doing business and if so, it is certainly something that needs should be protected with vigi-lance and integrity.”


ver past few years, Orica has been at the helm of next-generation blasting technology and their latest WebGen, world’s first Wireless Initiating System for mining, the company believes they have made a significant step in the evolution of blast initiation.

The system includes wireless in-hole prim-ers which are initiated by a firing command that communicates through rock, water and air.

Unlike traditional “wired” systems where a firing command travels from the blast box through harness wire and into the detona-tor, the WebGen™ System communicates with the in-hole primer via Ultra Low-Fre-quency signals called Electro Magnetic In-duction.

The blasting sequence is ‘stored’ in the

Next-generation technology delivers blasting for Africa

O Primer during encoding which is performed when charging the blast.

“This industry-changing technology en-ables new mining methods and blasting techniques to increase productivity and reduce operating costs,” explains Emma Axelsson, Orica’s Marketing Communica-tions Specialist, EMEA.

During the same time, Orica has also devel-oped the next generation BlastIQ, a cloud-based digital platform designed specifical-ly to enable continuous improvement of blasting outcomes by integrating data and insights from digitally connected technolo-gies across the drill and blast process.

From pre-blast modelling through to post-blast measurement and analysis, the BlastIQ platform delivers the data, bench-marks and insights needed to ensure sus-

tainable, cost-effective improvements in blast performance operations.

Reflecting on the African mining sector in the age of Industry 4.0, Axelsson believes that the needs to commit to a long-term view. “The longer the agreements with Afri-can governments, the better for the sector. Mining is a long-term game with a high cap-ital requirement that requires a discipline that is different from other industries.

That discipline starts with safety and con-tinues through every process of every cent spent on every ton mined. The last decade improved our sensitivity in managing the cost of mining these bulk products, and we as miners were happier than we were pre-viously.

“In the new age of digital mining platforms, we can go beyond that with products such as WebGen, BlastIQ and FRAGTrac, backed by our world-class materials management systems, Orica is now capable of mining to a granular level of optimisation.

“We have partnered with world-class miners who have committed their time and energy to customise these applications for their mines and the results are a ‘step change’ in safety, costs and optimisation.

“So, commitment to digital platforms over a longer period reduces the total cost of mining and improves safety and efficiency – we have demonstrated it and want to share these learnings all over Africa more broadly in 2020,” she concludes.

Orica is keenly focused on the African mar-ket to expand its operations. Speaking about its plans on the continent, Axelsson explains that the company plans to bring on more resources in the underground min-ing sector and to roll out its WebGen and BlastIQ products.

“Our underground software support pack-age upgrade is also on the way and we are proud to say that several of these products are ‘world firsts’ and cannot be matched in the market;” she adds.

“Our other focus is on optimising our lo-gistics routes as we win new business. We have just committed our supply chain team to big targets in 2020 to reduce the cost to all our customers throughout Africa. It’s a big ask, but we are confident that the tools we deploy to optimise our business are cut-ting edge and deliver real value, as we have done in 2019,” concludes Axelsson.



he mining sector has stepped up the pace to embrace digitalisation, with companies reaping the benefits from higher productivity and a more integrated work environment.

Within a tough mining environment with complex challenges, Siemens has provided solutions to ensure that mining companies become stronger and more cost-effective and innovative.

“We need to ensure that South Africans are participating in the technology change, and are ahead of the pack,” said CEO of Siemens Southern & Eastern Africa, Sabine Dall’Omo.

An assessment of various industries in South Africa, updated by Deloitte in part-nership with Siemens last year, showed that most of the applications in the digital space are in the private sector. Many companies in the food and beverage sector, as well as packaging, have embraced new tech-nology, while the mining sector is moving increasingly into space by integrating digi-talisation into its operations.

“South Africa is currently on the cutting edge of development, particularly in soft-ware development on specific applications customized for the individual client, and then integrating these into a cloud solution for mines,” said Dall’Omo.

She said digital applications are able to take productivity to a higher level, while tech-nology also helped to boost the quality of commodities. Mines provide a creative and exciting space for innovation. Solutions are fine-tuned and customized according to the needs of each client.

Through Siemens’ MindSphere Industrial IoT platform, companies are able to se-curely deploy cloud applications to achieve targeted outcomes. The company also uses modern analytic tools to better understand and improve processes.

Siemens’ SIMINE solutions enable ma-chines such as belt conveyor systems, ball

Siemens leads the way in technology solutions in the mining sector

T mills and crushers to supply data. Its op-timal process control, manufacturing exe-cution systems and automated stockpile management solutions are aimed at creat-ing leaner, safer and more efficient mining operations.

With more urgency to cut emissions, reduce water use and conserve energy, mining companies are also turning to technology to make their operations more sustainable.“Through technology solutions, mining op-erators are able to ensure that water and other environmental impacts are reduced,” said Dall’Omo.

Siemens is committed to building and op-erating applications and to transforming businesses, while at the same time also en-suring that data is protected.

“Our technology is state-of-the-art. It can be customized to a plant while ensuring you have a significant amount of safety with regards to data protection,” assured Dall’Omo.

Digitalisation can also be applied every step of the way. “Our role at Siemens is to provide technology across the whole value stream, from exploration, through to pro-duction and even mine closure and rehabil-itation.”

Technology is constantly evolving.

“Digital solutions are no longer something that you get from a shelf. They are unique and developed according to the end cus-tomer. We develop defined products and solutions for each individual client and mine because every setting is different, every ex-ploration is different,” said Dall’Omo.

“We work with the mine operator and de-velop the precise technology for the mine. While applications are customised for the individual client, this is then integrated into a cloud solution.” Combining skills and abilities through a collaborative effort has brought rewards.

“We try to source all the skills we need,

from the engineer that has a mechanical and electrical knowledge of how an app works to the software engineer and to the cloud software engineer. They all sit in one office and work out the challenge together. We also incorporate the customer into the working group.”

Dall’Omo said technology has brought with it opportunities to upskill employees. It also ensured that companies remain relevant and up to speed with global standards.

Dall’Omo believes South Africa is brimming with talent in the automation and technolo-gy space.

“I’m particularly excited about finding this talent in South Africa. We don’t have to bring people from overseas. Our greatest pride is that we can do it all here, locally, in South Africa.” Siemens is keen to build on this and has implemented successful programmes to nurture a new generation of young people who are keen to move into technology.

The Siemens Digital Mining Incubator (DMI), which is based at Wits University’s Tshi-mologong Digital Innovation precinct, gives students in mining an opportunity to active-ly play a role in shifting the state of mining in the country by upskilling them so that they can positively contribute to the future of mining.

Siemens has also provided bursaries to stu-dents from mining communities.

“It’s very exciting. We have targeted chil-dren from current miners for our pro-grammes. People from the community are familiar with what the business is all about. We believe that if we upskill the young peo-ple in the community they are able to make a real difference.”

While certain jobs may become irrelevant as the Fourth Industrial Revolution takes hold, Siemens is committed to upskilling people from mining communities to be ready to work in a digital world.



rganisers of the African Mining Forum have revealed that this year’s edition is dedicated to con-necting promising junior projects with finan-ciers to propel the region’s mining sector.

“Africa Mining Forum will progressively establish itself as the platform for emerg-ing mining countries looking at promising juniors projects that will propel the region mining sector. There will be a strong focus on finance and investment requirements and opportunities in those projects, but we as organisers will produce the same quality partners, expert speakers and professional organisation that we have become known for,” said Elodie Delagneau, event director of the Africa Mining Forum

This new mining investment platform has its roots in the very successful Kenya Min-ing Forum, which ran for three consecutive years in Nairobi and then evolved into the East & Central Africa Mining Forum, which took place in Kigali last year.

This year’s edition is set to take place in Ki-gali again from 16-18 November.

he partnership between Lucapa and Safdico International diamond is expected to deliver tangible outcomes and enable both parties to achieve their aspirations of being major diamond dealers.

The partnership has been hailed as an at-tempt by Lucapa to benefit from the Ango-lan diamond sector liberalisation and other new regulations permitted under Angola’s transformative new diamond marketing regulations.

Safdico International resident director, Ms Rutang Moses commended the partnership deal, saying it was aligned to the compa-ny’s visionary plans to become a key cat-alyst of the diamond industry downstream activities. To date, Safdico has purchased 4 900 carats of rough diamonds from Lulo mines under the commercial partnership, she said.“Once procurement and manufac-turing costs are deducted, the profits gen-erated beyond the mine gate from the sale

Africa Mining Forum to connect projects with financiers in Kigali

Safdico, Lucapa partnership inspires confidence within the sector

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The 2019 edition attracted strong regional, pan-African and global representation, from both government and private sectors; com-ing from the African Union, Botswana, DRC, South Sudan, Zimbabwe, South Africa and Tanzania.

Says Delagneau: “Having been active in this region for quite a few years now and following extensive consultations with a wide range of stakeholders in the indus-try, it is abundantly clear to us that juniors and mid-cap companies, particularly at the exploration stage, are eager to have more access to investment and finance oppor-tunities. Furthermore, Sub Saharan Africa’s immense mining potential in key regions (ie. East and Central Africa will be at the heart of the debates) forms a particularly compel-ling business case to take this event to a continental scale.”

According to Delagneau, Africa Mining Fo-rum is a premium mining investment tool providing a unique opportunity for junior miners and mid-cap companies seeking investment in African emerging as well as mature mining markets.

of the polished diamonds will be shared equally between Safdico and Lucapa’s sub-sidiary, Angolan based Sociedade Mineira Do Lulo (SML),” says a statement from Lu-capa diamond company.

Located at the Diamond Technology Park in Gaborone, Safdico International has been identified as a preferred buyer to purchase up to 60 per cent rough diamonds mined at Lucapa Diamond Company’s Lulo mine in Angola for cutting and polishing.

Angola’s ambassador to Botswana, Ms Beatriz Antonia Manuel de Morais also ex-pressed delight over the agreement and highlighted that Botswana and Angola have created a solid foundation on which they could leverage in advancing their bilateral cooperation in a robust and synchronised manner to boost their economic growth.

As neighbouring countries, she said, the two faced similar socio-economic challeng-es, some of which required joint strategies

It offers a networking platform in Africa’s investment hub for hundreds of executives and decisions makers eager to engage with key stakeholders, investors and assets managers to identify promising projects and deploy capital.

Last year’s East & Central Africa Mining Forum in Rwanda, which was opened by the Rwandan Prime Minister, Dr Édouard Ngirente, attracted almost 800 attendees from 45 countries.

Some 105 mining houses and exploration companies were represented with 113 ex-pert speakers in the strategic conference, while 28 sponsors showcased their special-ist services and technology.

From 16-18 November this year, the re-named Africa Mining Forum is expecting more than 1000 mining and investment professionals to gather in Kigali and 10 re-gional mining ministers have been invited to be part of this exciting springboard for new and existing mining ventures.

to address, thus the Lucapa and Safdico deal could not be more appropriate and timely.

The partnership, she said, supported An-gola’s new diamond industry framework, which aimed to attract direct mining invest-ment and increase Angola’s diamond flow across the world as well as increase new revenue streams.

She said it was pleasing to note that such bilateral relations had proven to be a useful mechanism, not only in strengthening rela-tions between the two countries, but also creating a conducive and enabling envi-ronment for investors in both countries to engage in profitable business partnerships.

Ambassador Manuel de Morais noted with satisfaction that progress had been made in deepening cooperation in several areas including agriculture, energy, mining and many others, which would all be beneficial to the two country’s economies.

Regional News


t Umicore’s industrial facility in Antwerp, hundreds of workers wearing yellow safety vests turn up every day to recover gold, silver, copper, lithium and other metals and minerals from towering piles of discarded mobile phones.

The company is now one of the biggest players in a new industry that has the po-tential to transform the way we consume the raw materials used in the increasing numbers of electronic devices we buy each year. Urban mining, as this activity is called, aims to recycle some of the estimated $62.5 billion worth of electronic waste generated each year – about three times the value of the world’s annual silver production.

Computers, mobile phones and other electronic products use a staggering 320 tonnes of gold, and more than 7,500 tonnes of silver every year, according to the Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI), a collabo-ration between technology companies and the United Nations University. But beyond the business prospects, the rise of urban mining offers an example of how circular economies can replace linear ones to trans-form not only the way we consume but also the negative impact our consumption has on the planet.

For decades, industrialised countries have disposed of huge quantities of e-waste by exporting it to developing regions such as West Africa. Agbogbloshie in Ghana used to be an area of wildlife and natural beau-ty. Today, it is the world’s largest dumpsite for used electronic goods from Europe and beyond. Impoverished families work in toxic and hazardous conditions to recycle e-waste materials manually, which is ineffi-cient and often dangerous.

Urban mining heralds the prospect of re-cycling much more e-waste in consum-er countries, cutting down on traditional transportation, which contributes to global warming. It can also recover greater quan-tities of metals and other materials from e-waste than the predominantly manual re-cycling process carried out in Africa, India and other developing regions.

Most importantly, urban mining can help reduce the amount of traditional mining ac-tivity in the world, an increasing amount of

An Africa without waste: how gold mining is going greenRecycling precious metals and minerals from used electronics can help make today’s consumption patterns more environmentally sustainable writes Chris-topher Kaminker, Head of Sustainability for Lombard Odier Bank

A which is carried out in environmentally sen-sitive areas and where mining companies are having to dig ever deeper to extract raw materials.

E-waste is a surprisingly rich alternative to traditional mining – just one tonne of e-waste contains more gold than 17 tonnes of ore – and is achieving rapid cost reduc-tions through the improvement of tech-nologies, collection systems and growing economies of scale. As many as 17 differ-ent metals can be extracted from e-waste, including silver, platinum, copper, tin and antimony. There is also plenty of it, with the United Nations University estimating that annual e-waste is set to more than double by 2050.

There are encouraging signs of progress towards a more defined circular economy for electronics. The European Union’s re-vised framework on waste targets a 65 per cent reduction in municipal waste by 2035, building on previous directives aimed at waste electronic equipment.

At the company level, initiatives are in full swing. Volkswagen is building a battery re-cycling plant that will support the carmak-

er’s goal of recycling 97 per cent of raw ma-terials in end-of-life EV battery packs – up from 53 per cent today. Apple has a goal of making all of its products from recycled materials. The California technology com-pany has even piloted robotic tools to help disassemble iPhones.

Even so, more needs to be done. Many countries lack any kind of legislation to deal with e-waste. And even with regulations covering the export of e-waste, the EU sees an estimated 1.3 million tonnes of e-waste exported illegally every year. Meanwhile, consumers must become more aware of the need to recycle their e-waste in a re-sponsible way.

A report this year by the World Economic Forum noted that a circular economy for electronics could reduce the costs to con-sumers by seven per cent by 2030, and 14 per cent by 2040.

With more effort, urban mining could, there-fore, become a win-win: benefiting con-sumers and producers while simultaneously making sure that our planet does not be-come a landfill of hazardous waste.

Regional News


hen the US and China signed a preliminary “Phase 1” deal to ease their trade hostilities on 15 January, hopes were high for stabilisa-tion of the mining commodities market on which many African exporters depend.

Copper was one of the first commodities to see a bounce from the deal, with the DRC and Zambian-mined metal – a bellwether of the global economy – hitting an eight-month high.

With trade war fears easing and major proj-ects due to be rolled out in 2020, the year could be an encouraging one for the African mining industry.

Guinea is on the verge of finally making the most of its vast mining resources, with rapidly rising bauxite production and a long-awaited deal on its long undeveloped Simandou iron ore reserve.

At the same time, South Africa is exploit-ing its dominant position in the manganese sector, but the region’s diamond exports continue to suffer from dwindling global de-mand.

And both South Africa and Mozambique are struggling with low coal prices, partly trig-gered by growing pressure on financial in-stitutions to stop funding coal projects amid a renewed focus on the climate crisis.

Simandou moves forward

The biggest recent development in the Af-rican mining sector is Guinea’s approval of mining on half of the giant Simandou iron ore deposit, the biggest proven untapped iron ore resource in the world with estimat-ed reserves of over 2bn tonnes.

US-China deal raises hopes for African mining sector

W Development at Simandou has been re-peatedly delayed, with previous conces-sions mired in legal battles between rival companies and Guinean governments re-voking licenses awarded by their predeces-sors.

In November 2019, Conakry approved a mining plan for blocks 1 and 2 by the So-ciété Minière de Boké-Winning (SMB-Win-ning) consortium, which comprises alumini-um producer Shandong Weiqiao and Yantai Port Group, both of China, the Franco-Guin-ean company United Mining Supply (UMS), Singaporean shipping line Winning and Guinea’s state-owned Société Guinéenne du Patrimoine (Soguipami).

The tender was launched in mid-2019 after the government cancelled existing conces-sions following a high-profile struggle for control between BSG Resources of Israel and Brazilian mining giant Vale.

SMB-Winning prevailed because it prom-ised to fund the infrastructure necessary to ship the ore from a Guinean port – a planned deepwater export port at Matakong will cost $1.5bn to build, plus an estimated $5bn for a railway that will connect the mine and port and another $5bn in increased rail capacity in Phase 2 of the project.

The railway will traverse mountainous ter-rain, necessitating difficult and costly engi-neering work, including the construction of bridges and 25km of tunnels. SMB-Winning hopes to complete Phase 1, with a produc-tion capacity of 60m tonnes/year, by 2026. The output will rise to 110m tonnes/year in Phase 2.

Conakry has insisted that the railway and port be open to other users, making it more

likely that a Rio Tinto-led consortium can develop blocks 3 and 4. After more than two decades trying and failing to develop Simandou, Rio Tinto seemed ready to pull out but the recent deal should increase its enthusiasm to strike a deal with the govern-ment.

While the long-term outlook at Simandou now looks promising, iron ore prices could slump globally after a strong 2019 which saw the biggest annual gain in three years. New supply from Brazil and Australia is ex-pected to close the supply gap for the key steel ingredient, sending prices lower, while slowing economic growth in China could further weigh on prospects.

Simandou will also strengthen Guinea’s crucial bauxite industry. The country has the world’s largest reserves of the miner-al, which is used in the chemical, petrol and cement industries and is the world’s third-largest producer. Production reached 60m tonnes in 2018 and continues to rise.SMB is the biggest bauxite producer in the country, with an output of 42m tonnes in 2018. Eurasian Resources and Alufer are both looking to further develop prospects in the country. Guinea Alumina Corporation (GAC) is currently ramping up production on its $1.4bn bauxite project in the Boké re-gion. GAC is owned by Emirates Global Al-uminium (EGA), which plans to ship bauxite from Guinea to its new refinery in the United Arab Emirates.

South Africa struggles

Elsewhere, South Africa’s position as the most important mining country in Africa re-mains under threat. The sector has been hit by years of regulatory uncertainty, strikes and low prices, and has been caught up in

With fears of a trade war easing and major projects such as Simandou in Guinea being rolled out, prospects are encouraging for African mining in 2020. Neil Ford reports

Regional News


corruption scandals.

The introduction of the long-awaited 2018 Mining Charter offered some certainty around the future of the industry and its of-ten-troubled relationship with government, but legal challenges still rumble over the extent of companies’ responsibility for in-frastructure and social services for workers. South African mining and power sectors re-main mired in a troubled relationship. Pow-er shortages caused some mines to halt production in 2019, while the government wants to reduce the price power utility Es-kom pays for coal.

The CEO of South Africa’s Minerals Council, Roger Baxter, said in December: “Eskom is essentially making an industrial policy de-cision to downscale the mining sector.” He called on mining companies to generate more of their electricity or source it from in-dependent power producers.

But one area where South Africa is making huge progress is in manganese, commonly used in battery production. The amount of manganese transported by Transnet, which is developing a new manganese export ter-minal in the Eastern Cape, increased from 5m tonnes in 2012-13 to 15.1m tonnes in 2018-19.

The state-owned transport facility has signed 10 long-term transport contracts with mining firms under its Manganese Ex-port Capacity Allocation programme.

With 75% of the world’s reserves, South Africa enjoys a dominant position in the manganese sector. Gold has also been per-forming strongly amid geopolitical tensions – the safe-haven metal hit a seven-year high in January as US-Iran tensions spooked markets. Further turmoil in 2020 could offer cheer for South African gold miners.

Diamonds present another challenge for

Southern Africa’s mining executives. In Bo-tswana, where diamonds account for a fifth of GDP, the industry is currently the focus of intense discussions. Negotiations between De Beers and the government are taking place to hammer out a new contract for the sorting, valuing and sale of diamonds from mines run by their joint venture Debswana.

The negotiations are set against a backdrop of weakening global diamond demand, which may allow De Beers to demand more lenient terms. Macroeconomic uncertainty is dragging on consumer spending in the US and China, while cheaper lab-grown rocks are taking market share.

De Beers cut its diamond prices by around 5% at its November sale, according to Bloomberg, in a bid to improve profits for struggling traders and polishers that buy rough stones from the company. The open market price for rough diamonds fell by about 9% in the year to November 2019.

Ultimately, both parties are interested in striking a mutually agreeable deal to contin-ue what has been a successful partnership, but the government is expected to demand more local employment and beneficiation activities.

Climate fears weigh on coal

While new coal-fired power plants are being constructed in Asia, weaker global demand for coal and a growing focus on renewable energy and gas-fired power plants as the climate crisis unfolds have generated fears that Africa’s coal industry could be in termi-nal decline.

The Mozambican coal industry continues to grow more slowly than hoped because of lower international prices, and the country may never be able to fully exploit its huge coal reserves. The same problems face Bo-tswana, which has plenty of coal but little

likelihood of developing it unless prices re-bound.

Many of the mines at the heart of the South African coal industry, in Mpumalanga Prov-ince, are becoming exhausted, but the Wa-terberg Basin reserves in the far north of the country are finally being opened up. Trans-net has agreed to increase capacity to the Richards Bay Coal Terminal.

However, some progress has been made on developing a Mozambique coal transport corridor. A new port is planned at Macuse, near the mouth of the River Zambezi and 35km north of Quelimane. The project has been under discussion for several years but delayed because of weak global coal prices and the $3.2bn price tag for the port and associated railway.

However, work on building a new village to resettle people living in the proposed proj-ect area began in October 2019, increasing the chances of the scheme being devel-oped for an operating consortium led by Thai Moçambique Logistica.

There is more rapid growth in a less-herald-ed part of the Mozambican mining sector – heavy sands. Four big projects have been developed in recent years, most recently by Dingsheng Minerals, which is 85% owned by China’s Anhui Foreign Economic Con-struction Group, in the south of the country.International outlook

Yet a 2020 price recovery for many of Afri-ca’s mining commodities could be depen-dent on the sustainability of the trade truce between the US and China. Should Donald Trump hold his fire in a crucial election year and build on the pragmatic progress of the Phase 1 deal, China-led consumption could underpin a revival. If the erratic president chooses the path of confrontation, miners should expect a rocky ride.

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