eBusiness Weekly
Ishemunyoro Chingwere Business Writer
The Chamber of Mines of Zimbabwe (CoMZ) has come up with a coterie of proposals for Government’s consideration in the administration of Exclusive Prospecting Orders (EPOs) in an effort to avoid speculative ground hoarding and enhance miners’ access to mineral rich claims.
The proposal includes reducing the size of an initial EPO from the current 65 000 hacters to 50 000 hacters, systematic annual reduction of the EPO size and limiting individual entities’ access to an EPO at a given time.
The CoMZ is the country’s single largest private sector representative body and its views are key to Government which has made it clear that its economic revival strategy is anchored on private sector led growth.
In a paper released on Monday titled, “The Chamber of Mines of Zimbabwe: Position on the Management of EPOs”, the chamber noted that work carried out during the tenure of EPOs has over the years translated into numerous successful mining ventures.
The success, as per records at the Geological Survey Department, tabulates mines that came into being on the back of EPOs where mineralization was not known prior to the granting of the order and mines where mineralisation was known to be present but went on to be thoroughly prospected and delimited through EPOs.
Prospecting or exploration is one of the corner stones around which the Ministry of Mines and Mining Development hopes to lure investment, particularly from large corporates through the use of scientifically proven resource definition and quantification.
However, some sections — most of whom — were in the business of pegging and selling mineral rich claims have voiced their disapproval against the EPOs.
It is against this background that the chamber has come up with its set of recommendations to spruce up the management of the EPOs.
“There have been outcries that EPOs take up space and small scale miners have no ground to access for their investments,” said the Chamber.
“. . . we recommend that the EPOs be maintained. The current functional legal and institutional framework of the country if properly enforced can promote the critical role of EPOs in the development and growth of the mining industry.
“Proposals to consider include: reducing the size of the initial EPO from the current 65 000Ha to 50 000Ha, provide for annual reduction in size of EPO annually and limit the number of EPOs an individual entity may possess at the same time.
“Some countries use a number (limit the number of EPOs to a maximum of X EPOs) others use area (limit the total area covered by the EPOs — say not more than 100 000Ha are to be held by one entity at any one time),” proposed the chamber.
The proposals by the chamber are in sync with the “Use it or lose it” principle, which Government is pushing to avoid holding onto mining title for speculative reasons with no production or under production, which is not consistent with a given asset’s potential.
The chamber also proposes that the Geological Survey Department be strengthened to better monitor exploration activities as this will also enhance the quality of reports coming from the work of EPOs.
Zimbabwe has a very high exploration success rate of 3, 9 percent against a world average of 0, 1 percent.
