SRCR '09 Cape Town

I have been looking over the very full programme for SRCR ’09, which will be held in Cape Town next month. It really is a very interesting programme, with many papers outside what we consider to be mainstream mineral processing.

For instance a paper by Jane Hope of Plymouth College of Art & design is likely to illicit some discussion.

She states that the mining of precious metals and gemstones for jewellery is responsible for vast amounts of well documented environmental and social degradation. It will continue to make an increasingly untenable demand on water and energy at a time when businesses, communities and nations are having to find ways of combating or coping with climate change and global depletion of natural resources. Her paper will address four interrelated issues:

1. Can the jewellery industry exist in a carbon based economy?
2. Are multinational mining corporations justified in eclipsing artisanal and small scale mining enterprises?
3. Could the demand for precious metals and gemstones diminish?
4. Should the jewellery industry and the precious metals mining corporations be talking to each other?

I hope we have representatives from the South African gold mines at the event- this should cause quite a buzz!!

I have also had a message from our accommodation agent, to remind anyone who is thinking of attending the conference, and would like to book accommodation at the Vineyard Hotel, that conference block bookings are being held until March 9th.