BY CATHERINE MUCHIRI
THE Chamber of Mines on Tuesday said the mining industry was on course to meeting the envisaged US$12 billion mining economy by 2030 as it was contributing 80% of the country’s national exports.
Addressing the media in Harare on the side-lines of the mining conference, Chamber of Mines chief executive officer Isaac Kwesu said: “The contribution of the mining sector to the economy has always been understated as mining exports constitute 80% of Zimbabwe’s national exports.
“In 2021, the returns from the mining sector were US$5.2 billion. This is just a fraction of the benefits that the sector contributes to the economy.”
Kwesu said the growth of the sector can be attributed to the rising global commodity prices, and a number of initiatives to increase production.
“We are getting closer to the 2023 mining industry target of US$12 billion. Exports from gold are at 86%, lithium 83% and diamonds 51%, coal 21%, platinum 13%, and nickel 13%”, he said.
The Chamber of Mines boss said mining surrenders almost half of its contributions to the government.
“It is not our responsibility to ensure that the information of our contributions gets to citizens. In every job that we create in the mining industry, three more are created in different industries.”
The mining conference runs under the theme Consolidated Growth Drivers for the Mining Industry from June 2 to June 4.
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