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In 2004, the year South Africa's far-reaching Mining Charter was first introduced, black ownership in South Africa's globally recognised mining industry stood at a negligible 2%.

This has now leapt nearly 20 times higher to approximately 39%, South Africa President Cyril Ramaphosa highlighted in his well-attended, full-house opening address on day-one of the four-day Investing in African Mining Indaba in Cape Town which is being attended by close to 10 000 people.

"It's fitting that the 30th Mining Indaba is taking place in the year that South Africa celebrates the 30th year of its democracy," said Ramaphosa in outlining the significant transformation that South Africa's mining industry has undergone in the last three decades, after being a pillar of South African's economic strength for one and a half centuries.

Mining continues to account for about 60% of South African exports by value.

Working with industry and labour, the President outlined how democratic government had been able to transform the sector, which was notorious for labour exploitation, human rights violations, and poor health and safety standards during the apartheid era.

Today, the rights of 476 000 people employed by the mining industry are protected and a legal regime confers responsibility on mining companies to provide quality services and promote development in communities where they operate.

There are also a number of employee share ownership schemes through which mineworker participation in mining companies is being promoted.

"We are all acutely aware that we face strong headwinds, and a number of persistent challenges are impeding mining performance.

"Globally, commodity price volatility, high energy prices, geopolitical tensions and a global cost of living crisis are playing a significant role in dampening the business operating environment," said Ramaphosa.

"Domestically, the energy crisis and port and rail bottlenecks are putting serious pressure on miners' operational costs.Illicit mining, cable theft and infrastructure vandalism place a further strain on mining output and returns.

"We're committed to work hard and to work together to overcome these serious challenges," the President added at the event, covered by Mining Weekly.

Last year, the South African government outlined four objectives to develop the sector, improve its global competitiveness and harness the global drive towards sustainable development.

The first was to achieve a secure supply of electricity and several measures to improve the performance of the existing generation fleet and to add new electricity capacity have been taken through the Electricity Action Plan.

The second objective of accelerating economic reforms has resulted in the removal of the licensing threshold for embedded generation, with a third of this capacity supplying the mining load.

The third objective of tackling illegal mining and damage to infrastructure by establishing a specialised police unit, working with the defence force, has resulted in a number of arrests, prosecutions and convictions of the perpetrators of this crime.

The State-owned mining technology agency Mintek has sealed 251 derelict mines and shaft and closure of a further 352 shafts is targeted over the next three years.

Criminal activity, and copper cable theft, has resulted in South Africa's freight logistics system undergoing a process of rapid and fundamental change to improve its efficiency and position it for the future.

Working with the private sector under the auspices of the National Logistics Crisis Committee, the public sector is working to overcome the challenges with ports and rail, with the recently approved Freight Logistics Roadmap guiding this process.

"By introducing competition in freight rail operations, while maintaining state ownership of the routes, we will unlock massive new investment in South Africa's rail system. This will support jo...