South Africa Sits on $3.48 Trillion of Mineral Resources

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Written by Richard Finlayson, Senior International Editor for Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--At a time of turbulence and the beginning of a search for new directions and models in South Africa's mining industry, the country's mineral resources minister Susan Shabangu reminded parliament that there was a long road ahead for the sector paved with some of the richest unexploited resources in the world.

These resources are estimated to hold a value of $3.48 trillion, she said before listing a breakdown of metal and mineral resources.

Platinum reserves, in a sector which is currently at the epicenter of labor unrest, wage demands and stoppages, were estimated to have the highest monetary value at $1.56 trillion, followed by coal at $781 billion and palladium at $387 billion.

Gold, which for more than a century was the country's leading rich resource, also came in at $387 billion. Titanium, the key element for high tech metal fabricators, had reserves estimated to be worth $191 billion.

Grade A copper, nickel, foundry-grade zircon and special high-grade zinc had estimated values of $80 billion, $56 billion and $24.5 billion, respectively.

According to the ministry's statistics, the total value of primary mineral sales, both local and exported, reached $305 billion from 1989 to 2010. The total value of sales of all processed minerals in that period reached $68 billion, Shabangu said.

A report from South Africa's Chamber of Mines said that total sales, for all commodities, reached $43.5 billion in the period from January to December 2011. The Chamber also reported that the mining sector contributed just more than $223 billion to gross domestic product and export earnings in 2011.

With some fundamental shifts coming in the mining industry, massive strategic resources and a drive for increased beneficiation of ores and metals before exporting, South Africa, with its strong mining tradition, should be up with the global league leaders again within a decade.

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