Those who attended the African theme evening at Ratanga Junction during the IMPC in Cape Town, 20 years ago, will never forget it, as it is a prime candidate for the most enjoyable conference social event ever. With top class entertainment, fine food and wines it is fairly obvious from the photos below that a great time was enjoyed by all!
There was a record attendance at last night's Cornish Mining Sundowner at Falmouth's Chain Locker.
It started off fairly normally, with a few new faces and it was particularly good to welcome Laura Tyler (left on photo below), Chief Technical Officer at BHP, Adelaide, who was on a brief visit to Cornwall.
Laura was guest speaker at the CSM Association Annual Dinner in March, and what an inspirational speech it was, urging the young people in the audience to follow their dreams and to grasp any opportunities that arrive. Laura left Camborne School of Mines in 1991 with an MSc in mining engineering, so it was great to see the numbers boosted last night by a mass entry of new CSM MSc students who began their courses this week. These are the future of our industry so I hope we will be seeing many of them at the sundowners over the coming months.
The next sundowner, at the Chain Locker, will be on Thursday October 19th from 5.30pm.
The UK Mining Conference was held last week in Falmouth and at the final evening Gala Dinner at the National Maritime Museum I was pleased to accept the UK Mining Lifetime Achievement Award. I thank Amanda for announcing this on LinkedIn and I really appreciate the kind comments that have been received.
However, I want to stress here that this honour was not a solo effort and at the Awards Dinner I accepted it on behalf of MEI. As most people know, MEI is a small family business, and I must thank my wife, Barbara, who has supported me in everything that I have done in our 56 years of marriage. My partners in MEI are our son Jon and daughter Amanda and I doubt if I would have got this award without their contributions.
Amanda and I formed MEI in the late '90s and Jon joined us in 2003. As he now lives in Luxembourg he could not be present at the awards ceremony, but Barbara and Amanda were.
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| With Barbara and Amanda at the UK Mining Gala Dinner |
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| The MEI team in Cape Town in April |
Following the welcome reception of 20 years ago this month (posting of 11th September) the 2003 IMPC was attended by approximately 620 delegates from 44 countries. The technical programme consisted of five plenary sessions and eight keynote presentations, each followed by three parallel sessions. In the plenary sessions Brian Gilbertson gave an in-depth analysis of globalisation in the mining industry, Jim Finch discussed the future of mineral processing education and Robin Batterham presented his views on the mine of the future. Richard Williams discussed the impact of fundamental research on future mineral processing operations and Jannie van Deventer discussed sustainability in the minerals industry.
Supplementing the technical sessions was a record number of exhibitors of equipment and services and some of the photos taken at the exhibition are shown below.
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| The MEI team |
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| The JKMRC team |
We are pleased to welcome Newmont to Flotation '23, joining our other 25 sponsors,
Flotation '23 is now only 52 days away and over 200 delegates are already registered. The technical programme is still slowly evolving and currently there are 162 papers scheduled for presentation in oral and poster sessions, including four world-class keynote lectures.
Networking will be a major feature of the conference, and we have scheduled long coffee and lunch breaks and, as always, these will be in the exhibition and poster areas of the Vineyard Hotel. There are two exhibition booths still available for rental if you would like to highlight your company.
The conference gets underway on Sunday November 5th with a welcoming wine reception and then on the following four evenings there will be sundowners in the Vineyard Gardens and a dinner at the Gold Restaurant in the centre of Cape Town.
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| The Vineyard Hotel Gardens overlooked by Table Mountain |
We look forward to seeing you in Cape Town in just over seven weeks' time and invite you to register via the conference website.
Those who attended the 22nd International Mineral Processing Congress, which was held at the Convention Centre in Cape Town 20 years ago this month will never forget it. The conference, the first, and so far the only, IMPC to be held in Africa was a watershed and ushered in the 'modern era' of IMPCs. Prior to 2003 they had been rather stiff, formal affairs, but Cape Town showed that conferences could also be fun and that networking with people was just as, if not more, important than formal presentations.
The Congress was attended by approximately 620 delegates from 44 countries. MEI has an archive of very many photos from this remarkable IMPC, so I will be posting a selection of photos from the various functions over the coming days, beginning with the welcome reception, which was sponsored by De Beers Consolidated Mines Ltd, an excellent 'ice-breaker' to begin the week.
We are pleased to welcome Newmont to Flotation '23 , joining our other 25 sponsors , Newmont is the world’s leading gold company and ...
