'Roll out the welcome mat for investors'

The African mining sector needs to embrace partnerships while governments on the continent have to do more to make investors feel welcome. Randgold Resources CEO Mark Bristow believes this is the secret to long-term prosperity. While speaking from the perspective of gold miners, Bristow said it was important for mining not to repeat past mistakes by not creating real value when the going was good. “When the gold price dropped last year the industry was left floundering and we saw projects being cancelled across the spectrum.” He said in light of Africa’s vast mineral resources it was important to create an environment in which investors wanted to participate. “If you want elephants go to elephant country. If you want minerals, you go to Africa. Yes, there are challenges but in the mining sector there is profit to be made on this continent and it is possible to discover and develop profitable mines, but it means creating better investment environments and the way to do that is through better private public partnerships.” Bristow said mining houses were going to have to work more closely with governments if they wanted to see project success in the long run. “Our experience has also shown that there are stresses on both sides but it is mutually beneficial to have partnerships.” He said working closely with several governments across Africa it was clear that the public sector had come to that realisation. Citing the example of Randgold in Mali, Bristow said they had been operational for at least 20 years, and despite the numerous challenges encountered, they had helped the country grow to be the third largest gold producer on the continent. “We have been able to operate projects under the codes that we first started with. Yes, there have been revisions of those codes, but it has all been possible because of the partnership that continues to exist and grow between ourselves and the public sector.” He said opportunities were opening up across the continent but unless there was a combined approach it would be very difficult to exploit these opportunities to the full. “If we want to mine successfully in Africa we have to work together,” he said.