Presidential Address: Are efforts to mechanize SA mines too focused on machinery rather than technology?
JL Porter
This paper takes a personal look, through the author’s own experiences, at
the implementation of innovations in the narrow-seam, hard-rock mining
environment of South Africa’s mining industry over the past 40 years. A
number of examples are used to illustrate some of the successes and
failures over this period. More importantly, the examples are used to
illustrate that the bulk of the investment for these projects should have
been applied in a manner that could have achieved more sustainable
results.
The use of the word ‘technology’ in this context is also examined, as it
is the author’s contention that only measuring the performance of
machinery fails to encapsulate the potential of the entire system describing
the scope of the innovation being implemented.
These experiences and observations are projected onto the current
backdrop of upheaval in the relationship between key industry
stakeholders and the sustainability challenges facing areas of the mining
sector in the South African economy.
The paper concludes with some opinions on where attention can be
focused in order to develop new thinking that can be applied for the safe
and economic extraction of the nation’s mineral wealth.