Botswana game park to be mined
21/02/2009 18:06 - (SA)



Gaborone - One of the world's largest game parks located in Botswana will soon host mining activities, after the government granted 112 exploration licences to 14 foreign firms, officials said on Saturday.

The licences have been awarded over the past six years for the companies to do diamond, uranium, coal and base metals exploration in the Central Kgalagadi Game Reserve (CKGR) in central Botswana.

Besides wildlife, Botswana's largest game park of 52 800 square kilometres has also been home for thousands of years to people known as the Kalahari Bushmen.

According to Wildlife Minister Kitso Mokaila, the reserve's vast size - equivalent to Swaziland and Lesotho combined - justified allocating part of it to foreign mining companies.

"Why would I want to deny a country that started off as the 26th least developed country the opportunity to do mining? We all know what mining activities have done for this country. We are where we are right now because of mining," Mokaila told AFP.

Botswana is the world's largest producer of diamonds by value and by volume.

"It has always been the policy of the government of Botswana that where there are minerals, they will be mined," Mokaila said.

"Botswana has been built on the strength of mining. It will be a very good thing (to mine in the park)."

- AFP