SA slides in mining rankings

Johannesburg - South Africa is one of the less attractive countries for minerals exploration, declares the Fraser Institute's annual survey on exploration in the global mining industry.

The survey questions companies about their forecasts for resources prices, as well as their feelings about various countries; attractiveness in terms of legislation.

Representatives of 670 companies participated in the survey.

Out of 72 countries South Africa was rated 62nd in terms of its attractiveness for exploration. In the previous year's survey South Africa came 49th.

The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Zimbabwe, Indonesia, Guatemala, Honduras, Bolivia, Mongolia, the Philippines, Ecuador, Venezuela and the American federal state of California nevertheless were rated below South Africa.

Canada, and its province of Quebec in particular, has for many years been regarded as the most accommodative region in which to look for minerals. This criterion measures only how amenable regulation is found to be. From a purely technical viewpoint respondents? views on a region differ widely.

For the second successive year the DRC has been declared the most promising exploration area in the world - if regulation is not taken into account.

With all its regulatory and political problems, however, the DRC's popularity falls to 68 out of the 72 regions involved in the survey. South Africa's mature mineral wealth earns it 48th place.

The companies participating in the survey together spent $2.9bn on exploration in 2009. This was almost 20% down on 2008, but most of them intend to enlarge their exploration budget this year, the Fraser report points out.

- Sake24.com

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