As the latest statistics from Productivity SA show that labour productivity in the mining sector fell almost 7% last year, mine management urgently needs a long-term vision for an operating environment that will improve output per worker, consulting engineering firm SRK Consulting chairperson Roger Dixon points out.

Other recently released figures – from Statistics South Africa – showed that mining production dropped almost 6% in the June quarter, compared with last year, and the industry shed over 4% of its jobs.
Deeper mines, more challenging orebodies and recent labour unrest have all been factors in the steadily declining productivity, says Dixon, but the sector has been slow in finding sustainable solutions to these challenges.

“The sad fact is that we have been conducting our mining operations in essentially the same way for decades, and expect our efforts to somehow have a different and better result,” he says.

“The future of mining will have to be based on more innovative technology, for instance, but our research and development initiatives remain uncoordinated and under-funded.”

South Africa’s rating slipped again in the World Economic Forum’s global competitiveness index this year, falling three places to 56 out of 144 countries.
“In a productive economy, we would expect to see certain trends – such as rising levels of labour utilised alongside wage level increases in line with inflation,” says Dixon. “Mining shows the opposite trends, with employment falling and wage increases regularly outstripping the overall consumer price index.”
Recent labour disputes on mines have led to more frequent discussions about mechanisation, with Productivity SA highlighting the long-term benefits of mechanised production: the higher profits that mechanisation and automation can produce, and the generation of savings that can be ploughed into new job-creating enterprises.
However, Dixon says mechanising and automating in conditions of high unemployment create a dilemma, and he emphasises the importance of steady and long-term implementation of innovation in working practices and technology.
“The logistics systems on our mines are a good example of where we could improve productivity substantially,” he says. “The distances from surface to the working faces of our deep-level mines have increased significantly since the 1950s and 1960s, but we have not adapted our supply chain technology sufficiently to address this. We simply lose more and more productive time as workers spend a greater portion of their day travelling to and from the stopes.”
While machines and systems are vital to better productivity, so is the health of the workers themselves, Dixon notes. To operate at their peak, staff need to be healthy, well nourished and well rested; however, it is increasingly clear that the living environment around many mines – with large numbers of workers in informal housing – is not conducive to this level of wellbeing.
“Ill health, fatigue and stress also contribute to accidents, which, in turn, erode the productive hours that staff spend at work – not to mention the resulting work interruptions and regulated stoppages that follow an incident,” says Dixon.
He says it is vital for the survival of South Africa-based mines that management grasp the productivity nettle with commitment to strategise to develop and implement new ways of working, underpinned by research and active consultation with labour and other stakeholders.