The Sunday News
Simba Jemwa, Business Correspondent
A GROUP of small-scale and artisanal miners who resolved to form a national association exactly one year ago as a way of eliminating challenges they face in the mining sector is happy with the milestones it has accomplished.
The member-driven Zimbabwe Artisanal Miners Association (Zama) was formed last year with its key mandate being the formalisation of artisanal and small-scale miners’ operations across the eight mining provinces in the country.
The association facilitates mine claim and tribute registration, investor consultancy, accessing loans for its members, mine mechanisation, capacity building through research, technical development and training among others.
Artisanal and small-scale miners have often fallen prey to predatory buyers who purchase their product at unreasonably low prices
Sunday News spoke to the brains behind the association, national president, Mrs Constance Muchoni who shared the association’s vision and recent growth in membership.
“Since formation last year in February, we have had progress in terms of members. In the past year, we have managed to grow our membership to around 50 000 across the eight mining provinces of Zimbabwe.
This is very positive for both the miners and the sector as a whole because we now have at least 50 000 miners who are contributing to the fiscus and the Second Republic’s Vision 2030.
In the last six months alone, we managed to register 32 000 new members across the country,” she said.
Zama has entered into an agreement with BancABC for the capacitation of small-scale miners and artisanal miners through a financing scheme.
The association has also created an “investor lounge”, a package which offers consulting services to associate members or investors. Zama ensures that mining investors coming to Zimbabwe obtain proper documentation, registrations and licensing with the relevant Government ministries.
Additionally, Zama has managed to create “local clusters” that are headed by communal people in an area where there are mining activities.
These clusters, moulded in the form of “community share ownership trusts” are meant to ensure that local people stand to benefit from mining activities carried out in their respective areas.
Zama has also become a key player in promoting environmentally friendly mining practices and is an implementing organisation for the Minamata Convention of which the Government of Zimbabwe is a signatory.
The Minamata Conventions advocates for the ban on the use of mercury during gold processing given its negative environmental impact.
Zama is also looking into the use of cyanide which also poses a danger to the environment and is investigating alternatives which can be used to do away with cyanide use during gold leaching.
Zama has targeted using workshops to mitigate these environmental concerns among its members.
Meanwhile, Zama’s Matabeleland region president, Mr Godknows Mdhari said the organisation has a target of a national membership of at least 200 000 by the end of the year.
She said in just over six months, they had managed to sign up 32 000 new members.
“As an organisation, we are in the process of registering our members across the nation and making conceited efforts in making sure that their operations are formalised.
We are in the process of facilitating that Artisanal Miners acquire national registration documents and ultimately are registered voters,” he said. – @RealSimbaJemwa.
