The Department of Minerals and Energy in South Africa has confirmed that the number of miner deaths in the country fell over the course of 2008, Mining Weekly reported yesterday (7th January).

Thabo Gazi, the department's Inspector of Mines, would not offer official statistics, only stating that they were still being finalised and would be released at the end of the month.

However, he attributed the decrease to the work of the inspectorate during the past 12 months, explaining that it was more responsive to various problems than it had been previously.

He told the news provider: "We took necessary actions where it was needed, we stopped operations, we issued fines, and generally it heightened people's attention on the need to address health and safety issues."

Meanwhile, Sietse van der Woude, the Safety and Sustainable Development Adviser for the Chamber of Mines, explained that concerted safety efforts by government, unions and mining companies all contributed to the decline.

"Companies take health and safety very seriously. All the companies have put very elaborate programmes in place to improve safety and that certainly contributed very significantly to the improvements," he commented in an interview with Mining Weekly.

Last month, trade union Solidarity suggested that there were a total of 168 miner deaths through accidents in 2008 - a figure which is 23 per cent lower than the official 2007 total of 221.



Source:

SA government says mine deaths decreased in 2008 (07/01/08)
http://www.miningweekly.com/article.php?a_id=150278