The looming skills crunch in mining and the need to join hands (original) (raw)
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Skills needed by engineers in the platinum mining industry in South Africa
2013 Proceedings of PICMET '13: Technology Management in the IT-Driven Services (PICMET), 2013
The South African platinum mining industry faces continuous challenges in terms of increased global competition, demand for productivity, skills shortages, loss of scarce technical skills due to emigration, strikes and high turnover rates. Hence, the lack of engineering skills (technical and management skills) may seriously hamper the capacity of the mining industry to ensure that productivity and safety standards are maintained. A quantitative study was conducted on skills needed by platinum mining engineers in three provinces in South Africa. A four-point Likert-type scale questionnaire ranging from strongly agree to strongly disagree was developed. The Cronbach's alpha coefficient was above 0.8, indicating high internal reliability. The population consisted of 300 engineers in platinum mines in three provinces in South Africa. A convenience sample was used; 79 engineers volunteered to complete the questionnaire. The response rate was 26.3%. A factor analysis was conducted to ...
Journal- South African Institute of Mining and Metallurgy
The Department of Mining Engineering at the University of Pretoria accepts that the process of teaching and learning improvement is an ongoing exercise with the ultimate aim to deliver well-rounded mining engineering practitioners. Various challenges impact on the success of this process. An integrated and innovative process was developed and is followed in the Department to overcome these challenges. The aim of the Department is to apply a holistic teaching approach by introducing multiple integrated interventions with regards to teaching and learning strategies. Three phases of this process are discussed in this article, and are illustrated in Figure 1. During the first phase, prior to 1999, several teaching and learning challenges were identified in the Department of Mining Engineering. These challenges are discussed in the next section. In the current phase, a variety of interventions to address the challenges are being developed, implemented (in some cases piloted), and evaluated. The future phases will focus on the improvement, successes, and full roll-out of current interventions, as well as on training, development, and support for all staff members to participate in the process. (Figure 1) The process of teaching and learning improvement described in this article is based on and supported by the prescribed Engineering Council of South Africa (ECSA) outcomes. These outcomes are also incorporated in the South African Qualifications Authority's (SAQA) outcomes for the Engineering qualification.
Validation of Training Priorities of Engineers in the Platinum Mining Industry in South Africa
The South African Journal of Industrial Engineering, 2015
Despite a significant need, there is very little South African research on the validation of the generic training priorities of engineers within the platinum mining industry. The purpose of this study was to validate the generic training priorities of engineers in the platinum mining industry in three provinces in South Africa. For this study, a quantitative research design was used, a four-point Likert-type questionnaire was designed, and a purposive sample was used. The results of this study indicated that theoretical knowledge, technical skills, management skills, and engineering principles are generic training priorities.
Immunotechnology, 2020
Pakistan has not developed its mining sector to its full potential. This is despite its quality mineral resources. Mining in Pakistan is mostly ‘artisanal’ and ‘small-scale’, and for this to change, the country must develop the skills to support a flourishing formal sector of significance in the twenty-first century. Pakistan has good quality universities with some of them already providing courses in mining. Building on this platform, NUST University approached the School of Mining Engineering at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits Mining) in 2011 to start a collaboration that will result in greater sector benefit for Pakistan. The outcome of the discussions was to do capacity building for mining professionals in Pakistan at postgraduate and post-doctorate levels. The approach used was to identify university staff requirements to support a teaching, learning and research programme for a 21st century mining sector and then to match these with the qualifications of the lecturer...
Curriculum Review Process at the School of Mining Engineering at the University of the Witwatersrand
International Journal of Georesources and Environment
The School of Mining Engineering (Wits Mining) at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) has a long history of Mining Engineering education, being the oldest and largest on the African continent. In 2016, the School celebrated 120 years in existence and according to the recent QS University Rankings, it is recognized as one of the world's top mining engineering schools, hosting an expansive program. It also has one of the highest growth rates of any of the engineering schools or departments, having seen a consistent increase in students to its program. (1) Need for re-curriculation: With mines in South Africa going deeper as shallow Mineral Resources are depleted, the challenges facing the industry today are substantial. However, best-practice innovations and technology offer the opportunity for the design and management of hightech mines that are not only safer, but also more productive and environmentally and socially responsible, while still being economically successful. Feedback from industry experts and alumni continuously alluded to revising the existing BSc (Mining) curriculum in order to cater for the needs of an innovative and technology driven mining industry. The School hence decided to go through a comprehensive 2 day curriculum review workshop which hosted academic staff and industry experts from several engineering streams. (2) Finding: The future mining engineer should encompass skills and knowledge in 4 broad streams namely: Basics of Science and Mathematics, relevant core technical skills, operational management and a socioeconomic understanding. (3) Aim: The School's new Strategic Plan and new technology driven curriculum will ensures that the Wits Mining Team can deliver Excellence in Teaching, Research and Servicein line with the Wits Vision 2022 of being "a leading research-intensive university firmly embedded in the Top 100 world universities by 2022". This paper reflects on the process that was undertaken for this review and comment on the final outcome that was attained.
Mining/Mineral Engineering Education on the Job: A New Concept
2007
The aging mining workforce in industry, government agencies, as well as, academia and the uncertainty of being able to replace them due to declining number of mining engineering students and programs in the U.S and overseas certainly calls for a more attractive mining engineering education program. This paper presents a new concept for mining/mineral engineering education, which may be more attractive to the prospective students, industry, as well as, academia due to the understandable advantages to all three parties. According to the new concept, the students, after spending the first two years in a college/university to complete the foundation/basic courses, will be centered in the industry, where minerals engineering coursework will be offered in structured or self-paced learning formats through the internet. The students will start working up to 50% of the time with the industry after completing the initial two years of degree courses in a college/university and simultaneously take the additional required courses for the degree through distance learning systems established in the modern universities. The concept has several advantages for students, industries and academia, including: 1) Earning of a decent salary by the students starting from the junior years; 2) Industry's early access to employees to develop suitable engineering skills; 3) More effective learning for students through observing actual operations while learning the theory behind them from coursework; 4) Industry input for continuous improvement of academic curriculum; 5) Increase in the flow of real-life industry problems to be solved by university faculties through research; 6) Increased participation of undergraduate students in university research; and 7) An improved relationship between the academia and industries through the students enrolled in the program for mutual benefit and the betterment of the society at large.
International journal of georesources and environment
Many countries in Southern Africa are generally endowed with a wealth of minerals. For example, South Africa and Zimbabwe are host to approximately 80% of the world's Platinum Group Minerals (PGMs) and chromite resources. Vast deposits of coal, both thermal and metallurgical, occur and are mined in significant quantities in Botswana, Malawi, Mozambique, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Zambia. However, the region has over the years experienced a shortfall in skilled personnel as well as well-resourced training institutions to convert the comparative advantage arising from the rich mineral endowment to a competitive advantage through efficient extraction, beneficiation and value addition. In recent years, Governments in the sub-region have responded to this unfavorable situation by opening a number of universities and other tertiary institutions focussing on educating and training a new generation of mineral professionals. This study reviewed the recent developments in the region and assessed the extent to which capacity shortfalls are being addressed in the minerals sector. The methodology included questionnaires and interviews, and the analysis was mainly qualitative. The main findings of the study were that although several mineral education institutions were being opened in the region, there is an inadequate number of professionals in the mining and minerals field in the region for teaching and research, and there are few wellequipped modern facilities for teaching and research such as laboratories and lecture rooms. This situation presents an opportunity for collaborative initiatives, not only within the region but internationally, aimed at addressing these shortfalls and ensuring that appropriate skills are developed for the mining industry and also for the academic institutions.