The Sunday News
Business Reporter
THE Government must immediately constitute a national gold mobilisation board that will come up with strategies to mobilise funds and capacitate miners as the gold sector alone has the potential to generate more US$6 billion per year.
The board, must be all encompassing to that it harness expertise from different sectors that are key in the production of the yellow metal, an official has said
In an interview, Confederation of Zimbabwe Miners president Mr Rangani Advance Chauke said the board can then take charge of distribution of funds and take stock of the gold that is being produced.
“I think frankly if miners can get US$400 million, they are capable of producing US$6 billion of gold per year. What is needed is an all encompassing board to manage this,” he said.
Mr Chauke said first the board can identify a certain number of miners per province and gold deposit areas, and support those miners.
“Mind you miners are not saying they want the money in cash, they want to be supported with equipment and material.
For example if we can just target dumps in Zimbabwe we can produce enough gold to by ensuring that we use the CIP (Cardon in PulP) way. We make that a policy.”
CIP is is an extraction technique for recovery of gold which has been liberated into a cyanide solution as part of the gold cyanidation process.
He said the board can comprise officials from the Ministry of Mines and Mining Development, officials from mining organisations such as Chamber of Mines and those that represent small and medium miners and officials from the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development “Other members can be incorporated from the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, security organisations and the local traditional leaders such as Chiefs.
What is key is that sub committees must be formed at provincial and district levels to ensure that the vision cascades to the ground.” Mr Chauke said such a board will also help to plug leakages such as smuggling of the mineral.
“From our break down we discovered that say if just 5000 miners can be supported and monitored, each is capable of producing eight kilogrammes per week and that translate to four tonnes a month.
This means in just one year those miners can produce 48 tonnes that can raise about US$6 billion in just a year considering the prevailing international prices.
This can also create about one million direct and indirect jobs. But we also have to look at provinces to see which province has more miners and select which ones to support.” He said gold mining was a low hanging fruit cable of boosting the economy.
“Gold mining can boost the economy. It’s money that with proper support you just need 24 hours. What it means is that we can then use the money we can get from mining to support other sectors such as agriculture and infrastructure development.”
He said President Mnangagwa’s vision of turning the country into a upper Middle economy by 2030 was possible and the mining sector can anchor the vision.
“Apart from gold remember we also have other minerals, platinum and diamonds, that can bring in instant foreign currency. All what is needed is fast track mobilization of funds to boost production.”
