BUSINESS
Ian Ashmole, chief operating officer of granite
producer Finstone SA.
those days there was not much in the way
of big surface mining operations, with only
Palabora, Finch and a couple of diamond
and coal mines. At that time, even managers
of major coal and strip mines were not
required to have qualifications such as a
mine manager’s ticket. Certainly, the major
mining houses with large mining operations
of a thousand people would require it,
mostly because to get to that position the
manager would have worked his way up and
acquired considerable competence.
Aspasa has made representations to
the MRAC on the basis that there are
vast differences in the scale of operations
between a small sand mine producing
hundreds of tonnes a month and a mine
employing over a thousand employees to
produce millions of tonnes a month; as
well as between non-blasted and blasted
environments.
Risk profiling
Nico Pienaar, director of Aspasa.
qualifications do not currently exist, says
Ashmole, and will need to be developed. He
argues that this will necessitate transitional
arrangements to allow for the development
of the qualifications and for the current
incumbents to acquire such qualifications
thereafter.
Aspasa represents only about 700 of the
2 000 to 3 000 surface mines, primarily sand
and aggregate, salt, dimension stone, clay,
silica and fluorspar mines. Finstone, for
instance, became a member only in 2015,
and many other dimension stone operations
have not, though Aspasa is broadening its
membership base. Clay brick mines belong
to the Clay Brick Association (about 150
members). Ashmole believes that without
the intervention of Aspasa, the industry
may not have been alerted to the risk.
“These current regulations go back to
the Mines Work Act of 1956, which was
adopted into the Minerals Act and again
into the Mine Health and Safety Act. In
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“There is a vast difference in the risk profile
– so how do we classify these mines? Big
or small, currently they equally have to
have labour and social plans with bursaries,
internships, apprenticeships and Abet.”
Aspasa and Ashmole in particular, have
taken up this issue strongly with MRAC and
its various sub-committees are currently
looking at the Chapter 2 (Responsibility in
Working) and Chapter 15 (Certificates of
Competency) regulations.
“Where we’ve got to in the Chapter 2
regulations is the need for three different
levels based on risk, and 2.6 has been
amended to reflect this. Level 1 is high
risk and requires a manager’s certificate;
level 2 is medium risk and requires a mine
overseer’s certificate; while level 3 requires
essentially a shift boss’ certificate or blasting
certificate. That’s been written into the
draft regulation. The revised Chapter 15
now makes provision for a separate surface
mining certificate.
“The committee still needs to work
through the shift boss certificate, as well
as a surface mine manager and surface
overseer certification. This is where we are
going to end up once the regulations are
gazetted. The initial idea was to promulgate
these regulations by October/November
this year but given the need to develop the
syllabus this is clearly impractical and I
imagine it will run into February/March
next year. Then there is going to have to be
a transitional arrangement.”
There appears to be development of
a separate qualifications stream taking
place by the Institute of Quarrying South
Africa (IQSA). It is looking at introducing
certification tailored from a qualification
offered by the University of Derby in the
UK. These need to be tailored to local
circumstances, and this is being undertaken
by IQSA.
“This is an issue [the DMR qualification
system] which had the potential to
make a huge impact on the professional
status of quarry managers and may still
make an important difference. There is
representation on the task team by DMR,
by the MQA and various industry bodies
such as Aspasa (but not IQSA). I have
experience of developing qualifications
through the MQA and if it is left to them
it will take two to three years because of
the bureaucracy inherent in their process.
Through the DMR it will be quicker, and
the DMR has been adamant it wants to be
in control of the process.
“Firstly, the Minerals Regulation
Advisory Committee has to finalise
regulations which stipulate the
requirements of the qualifications; then the
curricula for them have to be developed.
Then there needs to be a transition period
giving affected people a period of time in
which to acquire the given qualification.
“In terms of the smaller quarry
operations – the type mostly represented
by Aspasa – most will fall into the bottom
category, Class 3, which will require a
shift boss certificate and possibly even
just a blasting certificate (that’s still up for
debate).”
He explains that the largest Aspasa
member has used this classification system
among its operations: only one of their
operations just makes it into the medium
risk category, and all the rest are low risk.
“Therefore, very few surface mines would
get into the second class and require the
mine overseer’s certificate,” says Ashmole.
This is a far cry from the original version
which provided for no differentiation
between mining operations, and Ashmole
says the amendments are thanks to
submissions by players such as Finstone SA
and Aspasa.
Pienaar comments, “Aspasa has been
making it known that there must be a
clear differentiation between big and small
mines. The problem Aspasa has is that the
small mines are forced to appoint people
in terms of the law while down the road
there is an illegal operation which does
not comply and is not burdened with the
costs but is allowed by the regulator’s staff
to continue as a blind eye is turned to these
operations. These cases are very noticeable
and have caused certain offices of the
regulator to be shut down so as to allow for
a ‘clean up’.”
QUARRY SA | NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2018_17