adminDumisani Nsingo, Senior Business Reporter
THE Government is working on modalities of channelling chrome claims it ceded from the country’s two ferrochrome giants, Zimbabwe Mining and Smelting Company (Zimasco) and Zimbabwe Alloys (ZimAlloys) into a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) before apportioning the resources to individual miners.
Mines and Mining Development Deputy Minister Fred Moyo said there was a need for the chrome concessions that were released by Zimasco and ZimAlloys to be transferred into an SPV to ensure transparent distribution of the resource among beneficiaries.
“They (Zimasco and ZimAlloys) have given the claims back to Government but there is a need to access on the ground if the handing over by these companies was fair as well as to ascertain what they are left with.
“The claims must be transferred into some SPV from there then Government will distribute. Zimasco and Zimalloys owned 80 percent of the country’s chrome resources so where would the other players have gone to,” said Deputy Minister Moyo.
Zimbabwe Miners Federation chief executive officer Mr Wellington Takavarasha said it was prudent for the two ferrochrome companies to cede part of their concessions instead of holding them for speculative purposes.
“A consensus was reached whereby the two (Zimasco and ZimAlloys) agreed to release half of their concessions to the Government because the two owned 80 percent of the country’s claims of 36 000 and 53 000 hectares respectively.
“Releasing the claims addresses the contentious issue of tribute agreements. The tribute agreements are also regarded as not being standard by the Ministry of Mines and Mining Development to the extent that the tributor only sells to the tributing companies,” said Mr Takavarasha.
He said the distribution of the concessions was most likely to empower small-scale miners to contribute more in chrome production and consequently to the mining sector.
“We should also play a part to facilitate in the redistribution of these claims and preferably those that were the tributaries should be the ones that should be given first preference.
“This is more of empowering the miners. If you realise any export which is being done is as a result of the chrome which is mined by small-scale miners,” said Mr Takavarasha.
The country is mostly marketing high carbon ferrochrome, which sells at around $0,80 per ounce and is used by steel makers instead of the low carbon ferrochrome which fetches high prices due to high production costs.
Low carbon ferrochrome costs around $1,30 per ounce and is used for the production of aeroplanes and specialised chemicals and medicals.
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