ABSTRACT
Mining, like the proverbial serpent in the Garden of Eden, has never been held in high esteem. Most people consider mining as an unmitigated evil, and some who are more realistic, concede that it is a necessary evil (but evil all the same). This is not a new development. In the olden days, mines were invariably worked by slaves – chained to pillars underground, the slaves used to die in a matter of weeks. In the medieval Europe, being condemned to work in the salt mines was a form of punishment worse than death. Presently, the horrendous consequences of mining are evident everywhere. The land-
scape in some countries (e.g. USA, Zambia, PNG) is pockmarked with gigantic pits. As pointed out by Förstner (1999), the mass of the mine tailings produced worldwide (18 billionm3/year) is of the same order as the quantity of sediment discharge into the oceans. As progressively lower grades are worked, the mass of the mine tailings is expected to double in the next 20-30 years. Vast areas are strewn with rock fragments, and in some areas, Acid Mine Drainage has rendered the soil and water so acidic that not a blade of grass grows there. Whole towns (e.g. eastern India) had to be abandoned due to subsidence caused by underground coal mining. Mine workers are exposed to a number of physical, chemical, biological and mental hazards, and mining is ranked as number one among the industries in the average annual rate of traumatic fatalities. The iron ore mine of Kiruna, Sweden, is an outstanding example of how technology
can be applied to minimize environmental pollution, reduce energy consumption and improve productivity. The high-tech model used by the Industrialized countries to minimize the number
of workers and increase the output, is, however, not applicable to the Developing countries, for the following reasons:
(i) the investments needed are high – for instance, a block cave mine may need an investment any where from USD 100 million to 1000 million, besides requiring very highly skilled personnel (Fig. 3.1.1),
(ii) what the developing countries need is job-led (and not job-less) economic growth. A sensible strategy for the developing countries is to use the mining industry to promote job-led economic growth through the adoption of employmentgenerating, economically-viable and environmentally-acceptable technologies.
