South Africa's mining industry is in "crisis"

South Africa's mining industry is in "crisis"

Cecilia Jamasmie | Sep. 8, 2017, 6:52 AM

South Africa's chamber of mines says south Africa’s mining industry is in "crisis",as companies operating in the country have lost confidence in the sector’s minister and new investment has “frozen” due to policy and regulatory uncertainty, the Chamber of Mines chief executive said on Friday.

Speaking at Paydirt 2017 Africa DownUnder conference in Australia, Roger Baxter said there are a number of critical factors impacting South Africa’s investment attractiveness, including the fact that “the industry does not believe that the approaches adopted by the department of mineral resources are serving the national interest of the country.”

Examples of the dire state of the sector, Baxter pointed, can be found everywhere. “Real mining GDP in 2016 (R226 billion or roughly $17 billion) is smaller than it was in 1994 (R242 billion or about $19 billion),” he said. “Investment has shrunk over the past two years [and] the industry made an accumulated loss of over R30 billion (about $2.3 billion) in 2015.”

Taken from Roger Baxter’s presentation at Paydirt 2017 Africa DownUnder conference.

Baxter also said 65% of South Africa's iconic platinum sector companies had been loss-making this year, and will keep losing.

As can be seen from the above information that the demand of miners lamp will be lowered in South African market.