NMCS2 (National Mine Closure Strategy) Environmental Practitioners Consultation

A second phase of consultation on the NMCS has now been commissioned by the Department of Mineral Resources and Energy. The Council for Geoscience along with Prof Michael Solomon has been engaged as the lead advisor to manage the process.

They are adopting a totally new, interactive approach for this round of consultation. As mining practitioners, you are well aware that the commonly accepted practice for consultation is for Government to solicit written comment on gazetted policy or strategy documents. This tends to solicit highly positional comment that is often not constructive in achieving the spirit and intent of the strategy. It is hoped to change this format to a more constructive and collaborative way of approaching critical; policy issues. Having now received written comment for the first round of consultation, for the second phase we would like to adopt a far more proactive and interactive approach to the core concepts presented in the strategy and the written comments and opinions on these.

A number of constituency-based webinars will be held where issues pertinent to the respective constituencies can be discussed openly and collaboratively and in which we can get direct and constructive feedback. The constituencies include government at various levels, industries, organized labour and civil society organisations.

The primary objective of this imperative is to have a constructive, common-interest based discussion on what will work and what will not work for a strategy that will serve the interests of government, industry and the stakeholders themselves. This is therefore a golden opportunity for all affected parties to help shape the mine closure strategy into something that will work for them as well as the country as a whole.

This workshop with key mining environmental practitioners hopes to ensure that what is proposed in the strategy supplements and complements existing policies, statutes and regulations. It is critical to the success of this endeavour that we establish a legally sound and implementable baseline strategy that create constructive grounds for further discussion with other constituencies: we need to get the legal 'nitty-gritty' out of the way so that we can focus on the spirit and intent of the strategy.

As many practitioners as possible are encouraged to attend and participate in this critical workshop on the NMCS. The workshop will be very structured and dealing with the key issues emerging from the first round of comments. The advantage to your input is that at the end of the day the environmental practitioners and impact assessors are the implementers and evaluators of these policies. You know what works and does not work.

By participating in these sessions you will be able to place emphasis on the specific issues are critical to this specific constituency. The DMRE/CGS Team will be in the room to observe the workshop and to field any clarifications. I must emphasise however that under my chairmanship and facilitation there will be no positional debate. This will be an interest-based workshop with a specific agenda to find a model that works, with your participation as opposed to comment. My intention is to get the Minerals Council collaborating with DMRE on this key issue. I am aware that Reuben Masenya already has had a dialogue with you in July 2021, and this in no way infringes on this discourse.

The workshop will be recorded and transcript summaries will be made of each webinar;

These summaries will be sent back to you for ratification and amendment; and

The summaries as well as the responses to the questionnaires and the transcript will constitute formal feedback on the strategy.

This feedback will be supplementary to your previous written comment.

We look forward to your participation in the process.