South Africa’s minerals-energy complex, which was once world renowned, needs to be fixed to ensure that this country does not miss another upward mining cycle.
First it was the energy side of the complex that began faltering, now it is mining itself owing to some commodity prices declining. But the potential is still very much there and it is only tardiness that is holding back performance, especially on the exploration front. As things stand, more progress has been made on the energy side with the emergence of viable sun and wind power, but slowness continues when it comes to the public sector.
To speed things up, government needs to allow the private sector to provide capacity to remove backlogs and allow a more rapid change of direction at a time when critical metals demand needs to be met.