COUNTRY IN FOCUS
Geology of Botswana
Botswana hopes to increase the tonnages through the crushers in 2020.
Botswana. Plans have been floated to re-open the operations
but have not been found to be viable. It was estimated that
P6.5 billion would be needed to rehabilitate the mine. In order
to soften the blow of the mine closure, the Selebi Phikwe
Economic Revitalisation Strategy was developed, which has
created around 1 600 jobs in the town, but most business have
closed or relocated.
Potential in the north
Nonetheless, in the centre and north of the country, the Kalahari
Copperbelt is regarded as one of the world’s most promising
underexplored copper provinces. It stretches for about
1 000km from central Namibia to the Shinamba Hills in northern
Botswana, along the south-eastern margins of the Damaran-
Katangan rift basin. Mineralisation is hosted in the D’Kar
Formation (DKF) and Ngwako Pan Formation (NPF). The main
reason this area has not been fully explored is due to the thick
Kalahari Desert sand cover that can be up to 180m in places, that
makes it expensive and challenging to delineate any deposits.
A number of companies have applied for exploration licenses
and mineral rights, including Rio Tinto, Cupric Canyon Capital,
Sandfire Resources, Metal Tiger and Kopore Metals. These
companies have invested heavily in new exploration methods
such as airborne magnetics and electromagnetics and improved
geochemical techniques of partial leaching and hydro-sampling,
suited for deep cover exploration.
Botswana Ash (BotAsh), is a 50/50 partnership between the
Government and Chlor Alkali Holdings (CAH) Group. The mine
has a capacity of 300 000 tons (t) of soda ash per annum and
currently produces over 280 000t, making Botswana one of
the largest producers in the world, but with the development
of the Danakili deposit in Eritrea, that situation may change
in the near future. Soda ash was one of the few commodities
that showed positive growth in 2019. Salt production also
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The eastern and southeastern part of Botswana is
underlain by Archean rocks, with the Proterozoic orogenic
belt mostly obscured by covering. Most of Botswana is
covered by Karoo age rocks but is better preserved in the
north and northwest. The Kalahari Basin is covered by the
well-known Kalahari Desert sands and recent deposits of
the Okavango River.
increased, with the country supplying large volumes to
neighbouring South Africa.
Giyani Metals will start work on the feasibility study for its
K.Hill manganese deposit, which is a new project. This follows
on the appointment by the company of Lazenby Holdings
to undertake the environmental clean-up work at both K.Hill
and Otse prospects. Development work is also underway
at the Khoemacau copper and silver project in Botswana.
The appointed mining contractor, Barminco, began decline
development for the new underground mine in Zone 5 earlier
this year. Kavango Resources in November 2019 announced that
core and reverse circulation drilling on its Kalahari Suture Zone
Project (KSZ), in Botswana, had intersected a high-level gabbroic
intrusive, with disseminated sulphide mineralisation at a depth
of 53m and later also announced possible intersection of a
massive sulphide zone from a magmatic conduit-type deposit.
Botswana appears to have a bright mining future as it moves its
focus away from its dependence on diamonds and continues to
support the diversification of its exploration and mining.
About the author
Dr Nicolaas Steenkamp has a decade and a half of post-
qualification experience in the geological and geotechnical
industry. He has been involved in a variety of consultation
activities ranging from exploration, geochemistry,
geological and geotechnical, desktop studies, due
diligence, EPCM contracts and related feasibility studies.
www.bowlineps.co.za
African Mining
African Mining April 2020
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