Published: 17 March 2014

SMALL-scale miners have called on the government to come up with policies that promote their activities to boost mineral production in the country.

In an interview, Zimbabwe Artisanal and Small-scale Mining Council (Zasmc) president Wellington Takavarasha said there was need for government to come up with ways of supporting small-scale miners to increase production.

"We need the government to re-visit some of the legislations and change them to promote growth of the small scale miners," he said.

Takavarasha said government should intervene and support them with machinery to promote value addition.

"The government should make frantic efforts to have smelters and other machinery to promote growth in the small-scale mining sector," said Takavarasha.

He said as a mining council they were advocating for affordable licence rates for small-scale miners.

"We have a taskforce that is working on making sure that the small-scale miners get mining licences and to make sure that the fees that have to be paid are affordable and the prices at which the minerals are bought are competitive", said Takavarasha.

He called on banks to make loans available to small-scale miners so that they can be able to meet the expenses and get the required machinery for their mining activities.

"Banks should consider giving loans to small-scale miners because at the moment they cannot access loans from banks," he said.

Takavarasha said small-scale miners have the capacity to contribute immensely to the growth of the economy.
- chronicle

You might also want to read this

• Decriminalise gold possession: Miners
• Blanket Mine sets up oxygen plant, recoveries seen at 94%
• Zimbabwe starts repossessing idle mines
• Eureka Gold Mine targets re-opening by April 2021
• Illegal mining threatens Blanket Mine operations
• Caledonia eyes 75 000 ounces gold output
• Falgold suspension lifted as ZSE gains 8%
• Gold weighs on June exports
• Falgold ceases gold production
• Zimbabwe poised for gold boom