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On-The-Air (23/01/2015)

23rd January 2015

By: Martin Creamer

Creamer Media Editor

  

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Every Friday morning, SAfm’s AMLive’s radio anchor Sakina Kamwendo speaks to Martin Creamer, publishing editor of Engineering News and Mining Weekly.  Reported here is this Friday’s At the Coalface transcript:

Kamwendo: A massive power outage has not stopped Richards Bay Coal Terminal (RBCT) from setting an all-time coal export record for South Africa.

Creamer: Coal earns us more in foreign exchange than any other commodity so we really have to nurture that. I must say that RBCT, which is private sector owned, has really done a good job despite a big power outage, which was no fault of Eskom.

What happened is that the terminal, that turns 39 this year, had two cables coming in because it always is very cautious and makes sure it’s got belt and braces. They thought that they have got two electrical cables coming in and if the one went down the other one would feed it, but they both went down at the same time in February last year, which means they were set back.

But, that didn't stop them from exporting an all-time record 71,3-million tons of coal which is so vital to our balance of payments. They are actually now targeting 74-million tons. They are cock-a-hoop that they can do it. They have got a third power line coming in now, so if two go down they will still have power. It is a model of South African cooperation between the State and the private sector. It is a seamless operation when you go there and you just see

Transnet really doing its side with the rail story, bringing in these trains, 27 trains a day. These trains are 200-wagons long. Really impressive and they offload it very quickly. It is led-by Nosipho Siwisa-Damasane. A black-women is leading this show and is doing really well.

If you look at the shareholding, black women own 3,11% of it and 28% of it is black-economically empowered. Of that 3% plus is owned by black women. So a model in all respects, RBCT.

Kamwendo: High-level ministerial talk of the need for a new South African mining champion has set tongues wagging.

Creamer: When we got our political freedom in 1994 we were a little bit naive about economic freedom and we let some of our big guns go and list in London. Now, the Aussies weren’t as stupid when we mixed our Gencor through Billiton with BHP. 

The Aussies said no ways will we have a primary listing in London, it has got to be firmly based with the BHP Billiton entity in Melbourne and will also have a dual-link in London. We weren’t as wise at that stage so we let some of our assets go and an asset like Anglo American is now seen as London company and no longer has got any of this national pride.

We see now the new South African Mining Minister Ngoako Ramatlhodi saying that we must build another mining champion. It is very important to us to have a national mining champion here. We see him backed by ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe, who is an ex-miner, of course, saying Anglo American was built on gold and diamonds from here and cheap labour. To be told that it is now a British company hurts.

So, lets try and rebuild something, because the spin-off and multiplier effect that a champion like this has is very important for the country. If you look at other countries they have got some corporate patriotism. Nestle, although at one stage only 2% of it came out of Switzerland, it still calls itself a proud Swiss company.

We need some of that corporate patriotism at the moment. It is trying to be promoted now, we saw it in London. The Minister told the Financial Times he is determined to build a new national mining champion.

They are re-echoing that in Davos at the moment. This could mean some good multiplier spin-off for South Africa if we could have a strong diversified major again on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange in South Africa.

Kamwendo: A Gauteng gold miner is saving scarce drinking water and making do with treated wastewater instead.

Creamer: This is DRDGold. We drive around Joburg, we see all these mine dumps, they are being mined by DRDGold. They use a lot of potable water, a lot of Rand Water, which is worrying them. They are saying look we can’t vegetate the buttresses of these big slimes-dams and tailings-dams with drinking water.

We want to use wastewater in our mining process, because potable water is very scarce around here. They have gone along to the Gauteng Government and said let us build a 6 km pipeline from the Goudkoppies wastewater treatment plant and take it into our Crown complex near Diepkloof in Soweto and retreat it to get more of the solids out, but to use that for, not only vegetating the slopes of these, which is very important because it stops the dust and it holds everything together, but also to use it in the mining process and to make sure we use less of this very precious Rand Water.

Kamwendo: Thanks very much. Martin Creamer is publishing editor of Engineering News and Mining Weekly, he’ll be back with us at the same time next week.

 

Edited by Creamer Media Reporter

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