Sixteen ministers responsible for mining in Africa, meeting in Cape Town to establish the African Mining Partnership (AMP), on Monday have raised concerns that all funding now being provided to the mining industry across the African continent by multilateral organisations such as the UN, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank could be cut off due to complaints by the global environmental lobby.
Speaking at the launch of the AMP, South African Minister of Minerals and Energy Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka said South Africa could be the worst affected by the movement to cut off multilateral mining finance, given the high number of mining projects under way in the country that are being co-financed by the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the private sector arm of the World Bank.
Tanzania could also be badly affected, the minister added.
While not being able to estimate the total amount of funding involved Mlambo-Ngcuka said African governments were very concerned about the move and would shortly be approaching the institutions to ensure that funding was not cut off.
“The movement is part of the environmentally enlightened lobby that is taking its rightful place in the debate, but going to the extreme in this case,” she said.
“Although there can be a negative environmental impact I do not think it justifies the complete withdrawal of all funding.”
The minister said the issue arose in 2003 at a meeting in Mozambique where many non-governmental organizations (NGOs) made presentations on the negative impact of the mining industry across Africa and in which many African mining ministers did not participate.
She said that when the ministers saw the report back they decided they needed to intervene with the UN and other institutions to discuss the issue further.
The main mandate of the AMP is to champion and coordinate mining related initiatives in the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (Nepad). – I-Net Bridge