Prices up since the lack of electricity supply hit South Africa mining.
The PGM sector is the industry's biggest employer in South Africa but is facing challenges including unreliable power supply, increased PGM recycling, dwindling Chinese jewellery demand and increased market share by electric vehicles which require no PGMs, the Minerals Council South Africa said.
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The council lamented what it saw as the country's eight structural constraints to mining, including unreliable electricity, regulatory uncertainty, complex geology and the "significant" impact of crime and illegal mining.
https://www.mining-journal.com/pgms/news/1394825/pgms-could-be-part-of-brighter-future-for-south-africa-council
Miyelani Mkhabela, CEO and chief economist at Antswisa Transaction Advisory Services, said he expects the country’s economic decline to be higher than the predicted 7.2% predicted earlier this year.
He predicted a contraction of more than 12% by the end of 2020.
He called on the government to make immediate interventions to kick-start economic recovery by solving the country’s electricity crisis, which has now seen the return of scheduled power blackouts.
The country’s state-owned power utility, Eskom, has been beset with management problems and corruption allegations for years, and now struggles to supply enough power, plunging households and industry into rotating power cuts.
“If you look at the numbers, mining and manufacturing have suffered immensely and those are important sectors for us, which only work well when there is sufficient, affordable electricity," said Mkhabela. “Energy is the lifeblood of every economy, so it needs to be high among the government’s priorities.”
He added that widespread allegations of corruption and on-going revelations in an official investigation into graft are not helping the international perception of South Africa.
wsls.com
Not only South Africa (1st producer) as well as Zimbabwe (3rd) and other mining countries like Zambia and Namibia that depend of electricity imported from South Africa, the mining sector of the whole Southern Africa is suffering |
