Vedanta pushes zinc boundaries

Vedanta pushes zinc boundaries  

Vedanta is upping the ante at their zinc complex in South Africa and Namibia.

By Leon Louw, founder of WhyAfrica and editor of the WhyAfrica magazine.   

There is a lot happening at Vedanta’s zinc complex in the Northern Cape and southern Namibia.

When WhyAfrica visited Gamsberg and Black Mountain in South Africa, and the Skorpion Zinc Mine at Rosh Pinah in southern Namibia last month as part of the 2025 WhyAfrica Road Trip, Vijay Kumar, the Deputy Chief Executive Officer at Vedanta could unfortunately not join us.

Expansions are forging ahead  

However, we caught up with Vijay on our return to Johannesburg last week and had a fantastic interview about developments in this part of the world.

According to Vijay, Vedanta’s plans for one of the most significant zinc complexes in the world is forging ahead. Although Skorpion is on care and maintenance at the moment, new exploration results in the Rosh Pinah area were very positive and a feasibility study for a new project is underway.

Largest zinc mine in the world     

Meanwhile, Vedanta is upping the ante at Gamsberg. Next year the second plant at the mine will be in full operation which will make Gamsberg one of the largest zinc mines in the world.

“Based on further exploration being done in the Gamsberg area all result indicate that we will be able to produce close to one million tonnes of zinc and best of all we still don’t know for how deep the ore body continues, so exploration is ongoing,” he says.

Vijay adds that Gamsberg will be an underground mine within the next two years.

Exploration underway at Black Mountain

Although the old Black Mountain mine will reach the end of its life next year, extensive exploration in the area is underway and production will ramp up in the Swartberg area, where there is also the possibility of a new open pit mine.

Looking at other projects in Africa

Beyond South Africa, Vedanta is focussing on a very exciting opportunity in West Africa, and on increased production at it Konkola Copper Mine (KCM) in Zambia.

Remember that WhyAfrica will visit the Zambian Copperbelt as an extension of our 2025 WhyAfrica Road Trip on a shorter and more focused road trip in March next year. KCM will be on our list of site visits and hopefully we will be joined by Vijay this time.

If you are interested in becoming part of WhyAfrica’s Copperbelt story early next year, please contact WhyAfrica as soon as you can.

All WhyAfrica members will be able to listen to the full interview with Vijay in our upcoming WhyAfrica member report.

To become a member, simply visit the WhyAfrica website and register online, it will only take a few minutes.

Vedanta pushes zinc boundaries