ON SITE
A
frimat cut its teeth in the quarrying and
construction sector. In 2016, though, the
company bought Demaneng, an iron ore mine in
the Northern Cape province of South Africa from Diro
Iron Ore, and in the process became a truly diversified
mining company. The company invested more than
R450-million to get Demaneng up and running, and
through tight management of its equipment and human
resources, managed to turn an almost derelict mine
around in less than three years.
Demaneng is located next to Kumba’s Sishen mine,
in a prime geological suburb of the Kalahari Basin, and in
close proximity to the major access roads and Transnet’s rail
infrastructure. Notwithstanding its supreme geology and
location, Diro couldn’t make it work, and the mine eventually
went into business rescue, which opened the door for
Afrimat. That said, the iron ore price didn’t exactly assist Diro
at the time, dropping to levels far below the psychological
level of USD50 per tonne late in 2015. However, not long
after Afrimat acquired the asset, iron ore prices almost
returned to boom time levels, peaking at USD123 per tonne
in July 2019. In the process, Demaneng became Afrimat’s
star performer.
operation meant putting in the hard yards. “The strong
operational team was instrumental in turning the business
around and aligning the workforce with the Afrimat
value system,” says Odendaal. “When Afrimat arrived
on site, we basically found a failed mining operation. The
equipment and processing plant were in a bad state of
neglect and the pit construction and development was
totally flawed.”
One of the main areas the team focused on was
to deal with technical issues and get the mine up and
running again. “We called in the cavalry (other business
units within the Afrimat group), to assist with the repair
and recommissioning of all the mining equipment,
including tools, trucks, excavators, loaders and even the
beneficiation and processing plants. Just about everything
on site required refurbishment. To nurture a feeling of
ownership and pride, Odendaal decided not to appoint
external specialist contractors, but tasked the
operations team to do most of the repairs
and refurbishments.
Turning the mine around
According to Gerhard Odendaal, managing
director of Afrimat Bulk Commodities,
transforming Demaneng into
an efficient open cast
www.equipmentandhire.co.za
MARCH 2020
13