Financial institutions urged to support small scale miners

A GOLD processing plant – PGW09 has called on financial institutions and the government to strengthen financing of small-scale miners in order to boost mineral production and steer the value addition.

PGW09 is a locally owned gold processing plant based in Misungwi District that targets small scale miners to get their mineral refined before entering into the market.

“I commend all investors who contributed in terms of technologies in effort to make the mining sector more active including small scale miners for inclusive sustainable development,” said PGW09 Director, Mr Peter George Walwa.

Mr Watara mentioned inadequate capital as the major setback to small scale miners that cause them fail to effectively impact the mining sector as it lowers their production due to the use of rudimentary mining equipment and failure to fund the entire minerals production chain including processing.

He told the ‘Daily News’ during the climax of the mineral exhibition week yesterday in the region that brought about 1400 mining stakeholders from all over the country in effort to share experience, technologies, networking while formulating solutions to challenges as they aim at positioning the country as the mineral business focal point in Africa.

Mr Walwa noted that, the financing of small-scale miners would help them carry out their activities and maximise their profit while creating jobs and grow to become large scale miners in line with the government vision of upgrading investments.

“Formalisation of small-scale mining should go hand in hand with creating a swift system for small miners and processors access   to finance, fruitful mining investment demands enough money as it takes a long time to pay,” hinted Mr Walwa.

He called upon financial institutions including banks to visit the mining site in order to gather detailed information that can be used as the benchmark for allocation loan to particular small-scale miners thanking the government to set areas for small miners while asking for “one stop centre” that can facilitate issuance of licence to small mining local investors.

Additionally, He also mentioned power cut in small scale mines, low mining skills, and lack of adequate geological information to many small-scale miners as the key challenges that obscure them from excelling as they operate without a clear direction.

For his part, Instructor based at Tanzania Gemological Centre (TGC), Ms Lillian Petro urged all miners including small miners to use the centre to sharpen their skills as it provides training relating to mineral value addition that will enable them survive profitably in the rewarding country mining sector.

“Before setting any investment small scale miners should learn essential mineral information they want to extract, for instance Tanzanite detailed information, its appearance and price,’’ said Ms Petro.

For his part, ABC Bank Sales and Marketing Officer, Mr Pius Ndeki urged small miners to provide accurate information on the mineral presence in their mines to avoid exaggeration or falsification that reduces credibility to some miners to access loans.

He also called upon small miners to develop a culture of storing their financial document record to be used by banks giving loans as reference for providing loans.