The SAIMM is thrilled to welcome Dr Elias Matinde as the new President of SAIMM for 2024/2025. Elias was born in rural Shurugwi, Zimbabwe, in 1978. He completed high school at Kwekwe High in 1997. Elias holds a PhD in Metallurgical Engineering from Tohoku University in Japan, a Master of Business Administration and a BSc (Hons) Metallurgical Engineering (cum laude) from the University of Zimbabwe, and Postgraduate Diploma in Higher Education from the University of the Witwatersrand.
He is a Professional Engineer, a Fellow of the Southern African Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (SAIMM) and is a Past Fellow (2017-2018) of the African Science Leadership Program.
Elias has over 20 years of experience in academic and applied research, including more than 5 years at mid-senior to senior management levels leading multidisciplinary research, development, and innovation teams in extractive metallurgy. His areas of expertise include the development of nascent pyrometallurgical processes across various commodities, with particular emphasis on ironmaking, steelmaking, ferroalloy smelting, and production of technological and base metals. He is a co-author of a specialist textbook on waste production and utilization in the metal extraction industries (Taylor & Francis, 2017) and a book chapter on metallurgical unit processes and the production of slags (Royal Society of Chemistry, 2021).
Elias is a researcher whose passion lies in developing fit-for purpose technologies and pyrometallurgical flowsheets capable of processing a variety of feed materials at high productivity but with less energy consumption and CO2 emissions. His current research activities are focused on developing integrated pyrometallurgical flowsheets and sustainable technologies to recover valuable metals from industrial and urban wastes such as mining and metallurgical wastes, e-wastes, and spent autocatalysts and batteries, among other materials, in line with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and other emerging nexuses. He is an avid reader of scholarly works on technological and economic catch-up within the context of using natural resources as platforms for technological upgrading and foundations for industrialization.
Elias joined the SAIMM in 2011 and was extensively involved in revitalizing the Institute‘s Zimbabwean Branch, where he was renowned for organizing ‘sold-out’ technical visits and networking events. He has actively supported the organizing of a number of successful conferences and was instrumental in organising the 1st International Conference on Southern African Rare Earths and the International Conference on Enhanced Use of Thermodynamic Data in Pyrometallurgy Teaching and Research. Elias also served on the SAIMM Council for over eight years.