Mining In Africa Research Articles

Exploring Data Mining Research in West Africa: A Bibliometric Analysis

This research paper's main objective is to quantify and analyze the research output of data mining in West Africa, including (1) growth in publications as measured by the Relative Growth Rate (RGR) and Doubling Time (Dt), (2) productivity and quantification of research output for different institutions of the region (West Africa).

Metal levels in two fish species from a waterbody impacted by metallurgic industries and acid mine drainage from coal mining in South Africa

The Loskop Dam in South Africa is the most contaminated waterbody in the Olifants River which is a transboundary river that flows into Mozambique. The present study measured selected metal concentrations in the muscle of Labeo rosae and Oreochromis mossambicus from Loskop Dam, and assessed the human health risks associated with consumption of these fish species. Trace metals were below detection level in the surface water whereas bottom sediment exhibited relatively higher concentrations. A significant seasonal variations (p < 0.05) as well as inter-species difference (p < 0.05) of metal concentrations were observed in the fish muscle. Selenium concentration showed to have increase over the recent few years. Concentrations exceeding permissible level for human consumption was recorded for As, Se and Sb in both species. Other metals which THQ > 1 was Cr for L. rosae and Co for O. mossambicus. The current study shows that there could be some serious health and environmental implications for rural communities making use of Loskop Dam fish as food source. These findings add to knowledge in Africa, particularly South Africa, where other fish species have been identified as being potentially dangerous for human consumption in terms of Se, Sb, As, Co and Cr levels.

Safety and health before and after Marikana: subcontracting, illegal mining and trade union rivalry in the South African mining industry

ABSTRACT Mine and worker Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) remains crucial given the historically dismal record of fatalities and accidents in mining in South Africa. OHS also played a central role in the resurgence of trade unionism of black South African mineworkers in the 1980s. While the OHS literature has the workplace as its predominant focus, this article explores three factors relating to conditions external to and beyond mining production: subcontracting, illegal mining and inter-union rivalry. By drawing on empirical studies conducted over two decades, employing a range of research methodologies, the article shows how these factors impact negatively on the mechanisms regulating safety and occupational health. The article concludes that understanding the OHS environment cannot remain restricted to the underground mining workplace. Instead, it points to a broader conceptualisation of OHS and notes the implications for worker politics and progressive research practice.

A Practical Method for Compressed Air Leak Localisation in Deep-Level Mines

High electricity tariffs threaten the profitability of deeplevel mining in South Africa. Industrial compressors are one of the largest electricity consuming systems on a typical deep-level mine. These compressed air systems are also known to be very energy inefficient. Numerous electricity cost saving initiatives have been implemented to reduce compressor electricity consumption on mines. These initiatives, however, predominantly focus on reducing the compressed air supply to match the demand. Matching the supply and demand of compressed air is limited to minimum pressure requirements of end-users. Addressing the high underground demand, which can mainly be attributed to leaks, have been neglected due to the difficulty in identifying and quantifying underground inefficiencies. A new method has been developed to localise leaks to manageable areas in the vast underground compressed air system. In one of the case studies, the root cause of low compressed air pressure was found to be unregulated open-ended blowing pipes in the mining areas. It was estimated that conventional audits would have taken twice as long to identify these leaks. The removal of these and other unregulated air users resulted in an estimated annual electricity cost saving of R 1.4-million and increased the pressure for improved pneumatic equipment performance.

Economic Evolution of Underground Mining in the Chambishi Copper Mine

Chambishi commenced a research project to improve revenue at the plant. The research involves plant optimization, improved technology at the plant to improve recoveries and a global market study to identify suitable concentrates from which high value metals such, CHAMBISHI Copper Smelter (CCS) has assured its 1,600 employees that their jobs are safe despite challenges the mining sector is facing. The programs of nationalization were ill-timed. Events that were beyond their control soon wrecked the country's well-laid plans for economic and national development. However, surging copper prices from 2004 to the present day rapidly rekindled international interest in Zambia's copper sector with a new buyer found for KCCM and massive investments in expanding capacity launched. China has become a major investor in the Zambian copper industry, and in February 2007, the two countries announced the creation of a Chinese-Zambian economic partnership zone around the Chambishi copper mine Chambishi also boasted of a couple of well stocked shops although most of the shopping was conducted at Nkana (Kitwe). Chambishi is predominantly a mining town, with two of open pits mines at China’s Non Ferrous Africa Mining Corporation (NFCA) and the newly opened SINO Metals’ Mwambashi Mine. Apart from the underground mine at NFCA, another one has been opened at a place that used to be Nchanga Farms called South East Ore Body (SEOB) with an investment of $850 million. It also has a couple of multimillion-dollar smelting plants- Chambishi Copper Smelter and Chambishi Metals. SINO Metals has also opened up the Mwambashi Open Pit Mine in the southern part of the town and made a copper processing plant near Chambishi.

The Apostolic Faith Mission

AbstractThe Apostolic Faith Mission (AFM) is a classical Pentecostal church born in May 1908, influenced by the April 1906 Azusa Street Revival in Los Angeles. It was also born two years before the Edinburgh World Missionary Conference. Between then and now, the AFM followed a lone mission and evangelism journey outside the World Missionary conferences and the conferences on World Mission and Evangelism. Although the AFM grew from South Africa to six continents, its growth was encumbered by racist and colonial perspectives of mission and evangelism. Its first wave of missions was led by Indigenous South Africans at the Revival in Doornfontein and those from the neighbouring countries who worked in mines in South Africa. The second wave included organized missions by white South Africans, who unfortunately had to pull back from Southern African countries because of intensified struggles for liberation. The third wave was by local congregations that formed hubs for missions to specific countries (India and Pakistan). The fourth wave was by Zimbabweans who left their country because of difficult economic conditions. The isolation of the black churches in South Africa based on the influence of apartheid policies allowed black members to develop their own local ecumenical perspectives, which enabled them to have a broader understanding of mission and evangelism. This helped the church to move into the ecumenical world following the unity of the church.

Gender and artisanal and small-scale mining: implications for formalization

This paper explores the gendered contexts of artisanal and small-scale mining in sub-Saharan Africa, and traces how women are likely to be excluded from current policy pushes to formally regulate the sector. Drawing on qualitative and quantitative research results from six artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) sites, two in each of Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda and Uganda, the paper traces how the gendered organization of mining roles, when viewed in relation to women’s disproportionate household and care work, and the gendered norms around what women should do, devalues and delimits women’s mining work. The result, we argue, is that most women will be unlikely to access mining licenses or join and effectively participate in decision-making in miners’ associations/cooperatives. Seemingly neutral interventions like licenses or grouping miners into cooperatives may thus incorporate while normalizing existing gendered exclusions. The paper argues for a recalibration of ASM formalization to ensure that gender is placed at the centre of design and implementation.

Ecologically Unequal Exchange, Transnational Mining, and Resistance: A Political Ecology Contribution to Green Criminology

This article draws on discourses in political ecology and green criminology to critique the ways in which transnational mining is legitimated and advanced with significant impacts on natural environments and local communities in the Global South. It examines an ongoing case of environmental conflict related to Australian mining in South Africa and explores processes of ecologically unequal exchange. It identifies how the corporate tentacles of transnational mining corporations circumvent and subvert regulatory oversight to exploit people, land and natural resources—with devastating environmental and social impacts. Finally, it discusses the perils and prospects faced by affected communities, as well as localized movements of resistance and environmental activism when confronting state and corporate power.

Assessing the policy adoption and impact of geoinformation for enhancing sustainable mining in Africa

Abstract This paper assesses the extent to which mineral rich African countries enable the creation of public geoinformation for enhancing sustainable mining in policy contexts. The paper reviews accessible works and searches databases of industry, governments, civil society, academia, and international organizations. Focus is on 23 major producer countries of globally relevant minerals across Africa. The paper finds a disconnect between mining sector policy regimes and the desire to achieve sustainable development, lack of deliberate policy provision for the adoption and usage of geoinformation to enhance Free, Prior Informed Consent and public participation in mineral resource development projects. Out of the 23, only 2 countries (9%) have expressed the need for geoinformation in mining policies; as an input to public debate and data-driven decision making. Only 3 countries (13%) have set parameters for buffering around environmental and social variables. Out of these 3, only 2 have explicit parameters delineating exploration and mining areas. By not requiring public geospatial data, the implications are existence of poor benefit sharing, poor understanding of environmental risks, and a lack of integrated land use planning in resource-rich African countries. Hence, policy-oriented recommendations include expanding awareness on the value of and enhancing access to geoinformation, establishing paragraphs on geoinformation in Country Mining Visions, and strengthening local capacity for handling these data. Mineral-rich African countries must optimize benefits derivable from emerging Earth Observation technologies and associated spatial data for measuring contributions of the mining sector to specific SDGs.

Land as Natural Resource: Representations of Mining in Contemporary South African Landscape Photography

Photographic explorations of mining have an extensive history within South Africa. Late nineteenth-century postcards produced by commercial studios celebrated views of industrial sites. In his 1973 social documentary project On the Mines, David Goldblatt challenged the positive narrative of mining in South Africa. Recently, contemporary photographers have explored the industry through landscape images that present multiple narratives, encourage diverse interpretations, and highlight the complexities of modern-day mining. These visual examinations emerge out of a widespread interest among young artists in exploring South African spaces and the uneven social relations that condition their production. This article discusses work from three South African photographers – Ilan Godfrey, Thabiso Sekgala, and Jerry Gaegane – who created projects in the past seven years about mining and its social and environmental impacts. It argues that their work shows how contemporary South African photographers are using landscape images to look at environments in a Lefebvrian manner: not as fixed places defined by their components, but as fluid social spaces that emerge from an ongoing set of interactions between social forces. In doing so, these three artists show how landscape photography can be an effective means of exploring structural inequities in the post-apartheid era.

Africa's Mining Industries and China's Involvement: Sierra Leone as a Case Study

Africa's Mining Industries and China's Involvement: Sierra Leone as a Case Study

Mining and community in South Africa: From small town to iron town.Editors: Lochner Marais, Philippe Burger and Deidre van Rooyen.

Mining has dominated the development in South Africa for over&nbsp;a century. Although the South African economy is no longer&nbsp;dependent on the mining industry, this book clearly indicates&nbsp;that the mining industry still plays (and will continue to play) an&nbsp;important role in the social and economic fabric of the country.

Policy convergence on development minerals in Africa: A study of Ghana’s regulatory frameworks

The Africa Mining Vision (AMV) seeks a mining sector that “is diversified, incorporating both high value metals and lower value industrial minerals at both commercial and small-scale levels.” However, there are comparatively fewer large-scale investments in so-called low value industrial minerals (or Development Minerals) than in high value metals. This paper explores regional policies and interventions aimed at promoting the Development Minerals sector, to determine whether there has been convergence in the approaches across Africa. National level interventions using the case of Ghana are assessed to understand the effectiveness of such treatment in promoting knowledge and building linkages of the Development Minerals sector within local economies. We conclude with several recommendations, key among which are the need for actionable instruments toward the harmonisation of the AMV with the sub-regional policies, such as the ECOWAS Mining Directive and its Minerals Development Policy. To ensure regional convergence, a classification scheme of the range of Development Minerals is needed to define relationships between their volume and value. This will enhance strategic and targeted interventions by governments in Africa in the treatment of Development Minerals for domestic and regional development.

Tourism Governance and Attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals in Africa

ABSTRACT Inclusiveness that improves tourism governance is significant for development if benefits from tourism are distributed equitably. Declaration of 2017 as the International Year of Sustainable Tourism and adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have seemingly brought tourism to the forefront of development even where the SDGs have limited tourism focus. This paper examines how tourism governance is poorly applied in Africa. It interrogates the challenges of integrating tourism governance, mining, and conservation within the SDGs framework in Africa. Sustainable tourism governance frameworks have not comprehensively inculcated trust, justice, social capital, power, and participation. Using mining and conservation in South Africa and Zimbabwe respectively, it analyses how mining affects sustainability, as actors in tourism are unable to conserve and protect tourism sites. Achieving the SDGs requires collaboration between international actors, governments, the private sector, and locals in an inclusive governance based on justice, inclusion trust and equitable power relations. Highlights Improvement in tourism governance is important for development Challenges of integrating tourism in the SDGs in Africa Tourism governance is however poorly applied in Africa Sustainable tourism governance neglects trust, justice, power and participation. Mining and poor conservation undermines sustainable tourism To achieve the SDGs, collaboration among varied actors is critical

Governing with or against the grain? Challenges confronting African governments and foreign players in Africa’s extractives sector

ABSTRACTThis article introduces a special issue which contributes to the governance debates pertaining to the extractive sector in Africa, where the EU seeks a major role. Better governance is clearly required to meet the objectives of the Africa Mining Vision and the EU’s Raw Materials Initiative; however, there is growing recognition that better formal regulations on paper will not necessarily result in better outcomes on the ground. Greater awareness of the potential unintended negative consequences of some governance initiatives is necessary. Companies involved in natural resource extraction in African countries must consider their roles in the governance question in far deeper terms than mere corporate social responsibility or attaining a social licence to operate. Similarly, at the EU level, more attention has to be paid to what happens beyond efforts to create greater levels of transparency, especially in the effort to stop illicit financial flows.

Intensive and extensive margins of mining and development: Evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa

What are the economic consequences of mining in Sub-Saharan Africa? Using a panel of 3,635 districts from 42 Sub-Saharan African countries for the period 1992 to 2012 we investigate the effects of mining on living standards (measured by night-lights and household/cohort characteristics from Demographic and Health Surveys) and public service provisions (from Afrobarometer). Night-lights increase in mining districts when mineral production expands (intensive margin), but large effects are mainly associated with new discoveries and new production (extensive margin). We identify the effect by carefully choosing feasible but not yet mined districts as a control group. In addition, we exploit first, single-first, giant and major discoveries as exogenous news shocks. Mines in Africa exhibit enclave characteristics as we find little evidence of significant spillovers to other districts.

Large-scale mining and ecological imperialism in Africa: the politics of mining and conservation of the ecology in Ghana

&lt;p&gt;The article draws on the insights of political ecology to illuminate the politics shaping the enforcement of environmental regulation in the mining sector of Ghana. We argue that the Ghanaian state uses strong-arm measures against artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) operators, particularly, the subaltern classes engaged in the industry for survival. Periodically, the state deploys the military and the police to clamp down on ASM for destroying the environment, but treats with kid gloves foreign companies engaged in large-scale mining (LSM), wreaking similar disastrous ecological effects on mining communities. The state believes that LSM by foreign companies is a source of foreign direct investment (FDI) and foreign mining companies should be incentivized to come and stay in the country. Presented in broad-brush strokes as illegal (&lt;em&gt;galamsey&lt;/em&gt;), the Ghanaian state sees ASM as an environmental menace to be fought with all the coercive apparatuses that it can command. Disputing this claim, the article argues that mining-FDI is essentially ecological imperialism, wreaking havoc on the ecosystem of mining communities whose livelihood strategies are in conflict with the accumulation and political interests of foreign mining companies and the Ghanaian political class respectively. The article demonstrates that concerns over the harmful impacts of mining on the ecology of Ghana are neither class-neutral nor free of politics. They are rather highly imbricated in power structures and relations, in which the interest of the ruling class is supreme in the enforcement of environmental regulations in Ghana. The paradox of the biases of the Ghanaian state against ASM, particularly ASM operated by its own citizens for survival, and in favor of foreign mining companies engaged in LSM for profits, is explained with the insights of ecological imperialism.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Keywords:&lt;/strong&gt; Large-scale mining, artisanal and small-scale mining, Operation Vanguard, Ghanaian state biases, ecological imperialism&lt;/p&gt;

A Feasibility Study Evaluating the Efficiency of Fine Coal Washing Using Gravity Separation Methods

Coal mining and washing activities in South Africa often lead to the generation of fine and ultra-fine coal which is in most cases discarded due to high handling and transportation costs. Studies conducted revealed that a large quantity of these fines have market acceptable calorific values and lower ash contents. In order to reduce fines discarded, processes have been developed to re-mine and process the fine coal discards with the aim of improving the calorific value, adding them to coarse washed coal to increase the yield as well as pelletizing the fines so as to meet the market specifications in terms of size. The goal of this study was to evaluate the efficiency of fine coal washing using gravity separation methods and comparing the products thereof to the market specifications with regards to the calorific value and the ash content. Coal fines from the No.4 lower seam of the Witbank coalfield in South Africa resulting from a dry coal sorting plant were subjected to a double-stage spiral test work, heavy liquid separation and reflux classifier test work respectively. The reflux classifier achieved products with low ash content and an increased calorific value, at high mass yields. At higher fluidization water flowrate, the reflux classifier performance was superior to that of the spirals with products of lower ash content and higher calorific value. At low cut point densities, heavy liquid separation yielded the cleanest products with very low ash content but at much lower mass yields. As the density increased, the mass yields increased with the ash content while the calorific value decreased. Most of the products from the different processes met most of the local industries’ specifications but none of them met the export market as well as the gold and uranium industry specifications due to the high ash content.

Aplicación de Destress Blasting en desarrollo de túneles en ambiente de esfuerzos altos

Rock Mass preconditioning techniques, commonly used in the mining industry, can be applied to large scale affecting a significant volume of rock, or to local scale affecting a reduced volume of rock mass around a tunnel during excavation. The latter is the case of the infrastructural tunnels of New Mine Level project, at El Teniente mine (Codelco). Preconditioning methods include the Destress Blasting, which is based on the use of confined explosives that are blasted simultaneously with the construction blast at the tunnel face, this allows to reduce the load transfer capacity around the excavation. This technique has been used in deep mines in Canada and South Africa to reduce the risk of seismic events due to a high stress condition. In this study the authors describe the Destress Blasting technique and its design used in the Personnel Access Tunnel P4600 (TAP P4600) of New Mine Level project. Finally, based on the geological, geotechnical and operational data captured during the works, the preliminary results are given together with a comparison of the seismic behaviour of the rock mass with and without the application of this preconditioning technique

Diamond exploration and mining in southern Africa: Some thoughts on past, current and possible future trends

Diamond exploration and mining in southern Africa: Some thoughts on past, current and possible future trends