| Artisanal miners get Sh650m boost | Send to a friend |
| Thursday, 02 September 2010 08:40 |
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By Alex Bitekeye The government had disbursed a loan of Sh650 million to four companies in a bid to help artisanal miners. The money was dished out by a special fund formed by the government this year to assist small miners. The money was disbursed to one government owned company and three private firms. The Permanent Secretary in the ministry of Energy and Minerals, Mr David Jairo, said yesterday that the move was among other measures which were being taken by the government in alleviating poverty among its citizens. “As you can see, the contribution of artisan miners in the country economy is still very low and this is caused by many factors such lack of capital and mining equipment,” said Mr Jairo. He said the government established the Fund after noting such problems so as to empower various organisations by offering soft loans to them so that they can purchase mining equipment and hire them to artisan miners. “After a scrutiny, four companies emerged winners, these include State Mining Corporation (Stamico) which will build a mining equipment hiring station to artisan miners at Rwamugasa area in Geita district,” he said. Mr Jairo mentioned other companies as Tan Discovery Mineral Consultancy (T) Ltd which will establish the similar station at Londoni in Singida district. “Another company is Kilimo and General Supplies Co Ltd which will also establish the similar station at Pongwe Msungura area in Bagamoyo district,” added Mr Jairo. Another company which has secure the loan was named as C.E Holdings (T) Ltd which will establish a value adding station at Mikocheni in Dar es Salaam. “We had decided to help the organisations in adding values of the minerals because informal source of capital are mainly sources of mineral smuggling to the neighbouring countries,” said Mr Jairo. Meanwhile, the Permanent Secretary said that the government owned gem centre to be known as ‘Tanzania Gem Centre’ will be established in Arusha. He said the centre would have a duty to train mineral processors as for now the training is provided in Madagascar only. “Because the government has banned export of raw gemstones starting with tanzanite, we have to prepare our artisan on how to prepare their minerals,” he said. “We secured an area in Arusha city and the coordinator is already there, working hand in hand with the local consultant engineer on how they can develop that area,” he said. Add this page to your favorite Social Bookmarking websites           |
