MICHAEL AVERY: Mantashe dumps a steaming pile of excrement on the mining sector
The system for accessing SA’s mineral wealth is a bureaucratic mess
When mineral & petroleum resources minister Gwede Mantashe gazetted the Draft Mineral Resources Development Bill (https://www.businesslive.co.za/bd/national/2025-05-20-overhaul-of-mining-law-gazetted-for-comment/) last week it was presented with all the usual platitudes: transformation, beneficiation, sustainable development, investor confidence. The type of stock phrases that now hang limply over the mining sector like Mantashe himself. But for anyone who’s actually paid attention to the industry over the past two decades and not just lapped up the canned sound bites, the bill reads like the latest chapter in a 20-year policy farce.
Since the first version of the Mineral & Petroleum Resources Development Act (MPRDA) in 2004, SA’s mining sector has been eviscerated. Mining’s share of GDP has collapsed from 21% in 1980 to just 7.3% today. Exploration spend has dried up to a trickle. We “attract” less than 1% of global exploration budgets, despite our immense mineral endowment. ...
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