Govt moves to clear backlog of mining licenses by July

Government is expected to clear a backlog of the mining license applications by July month-end.

Ministry Mines and Minerals Development Permanent Secretary, Hapenga Kabeta, confirmed this in a statement issued in Lusaka on Thursday.

He said the Mining Cadastre Department has a backlog of Mining licence applications, which accumulated following the opening of the Cadastre office in November 2022.

Kabeta said the Cadastre Office was closed for a period of eight months to enable the Ministry of Mines to review its operations and the operations of the Office have since been streamlined to make it more efficient.

“After resuming operations on November 21, 2022, the department received over 2000 applications which are currently being worked on,” he said.

Kabeta said the Ministry is doing everything possible to clear the backlog of applications so that it concentrates on new ones that started coming in after November, 2022 and so far, about 800 applications have already been considered by the Mining Licensing Committee.

“The applications include Small Scale Mining Rights and Artisanal Mining Rights where most citizens, through companies, community cooperatives and individuals are participating,”he said.

Kabeta has observed that the rejection rate is high among small scale mining applications because of failure to comply with requirements.

He said the Mining Cadastre service delivery systems are being improved to try and minimize human interfaces from end to end and this will increase transparency and ease the application process for people living outside Lusaka.

“When fully operationalized, the system will ensure all payments and follow ups are done online. However, the help desk will be available to address client queries and inquiries as the case might be,” Kabeta said.

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