TENDAI BHEBE IN BULAWAYO
President Emmerson Mnangagwa has challenged the mining industry players to take advantage of the Mining,Engineering and Transport (Mine- Entra) to establish strategic partnerships, a move that will help transform the economy.
He made the remarks while officially opening the 25th edition of the Mine- Entra expo conference on Thursday in Bulawayo.
“The importance of natural resources and in particular minerals towards driving sustainable socio-economic development cannot be over emphasised.
To this end, I challenge captains of the mining industry to take advantage of this conference by leveraging on the new partnerships and synergies to propel the transformation of Zimbabwe’s economy, “Mnangagwa said.
He added: “On its part, my government will continue to create and implement a conducive business environment to attract both local and global capital as well as grow already established entities
“I, therefore, invite more investors to take advantage of the numerous opportunities in areas of exploration, mineral extraction, mineral processing, value addition and beneficiation.
” Plans are in place for the accelerated value addition and beneficiation of minerals such as gold, the platinum group of metals, diamonds, chrome and ferrochrome, steel, lithium, nickel, granite, coal and hydro-carbons, among others.
More so that value addition and beneficiation are the important yardsticks to benchmark the sector’s production levels, productivity and profitability.”
Mnangagwa said the mining sector should adopt modern mining technologies across the mineral value chain.
“I call upon the sector to rally its players to embrace modern mining technologies across the mineral value chain, “Mnangagwa said.
Government has set a target for the mining industry to achieve a US$12 billion milestone 2023 with gold, platinum group metals, hydrocarbons like oil and gas, coal, gold, lithium, chrome and ferrochrome driving the growth
