By KENNEDY MUPESENI –
THE Zambia Chamber of Mines (ZCM) will hold a conference in September to look at how the mining industry can play a major role in designing a workable diversification model for the country.
Acting chief executive officer Talent Ng’andwe said the mining industry was committed to contributing effectively to the economic development of the country.
“We are organising a diversification indaba which will draw participation from various industrial players in the economy to see how the Government’s goal of diversifying the economy can be realised,” Mr Ng’andwe said.
He said this in an interview in Kitwe at the weekend.
Mr Ng’andwe said participants would be drawn from the private and public sectors as well cooperating partners such as the African Development Bank (AfDB) and the World Bank among other stakeholders.
He said the goal of the conference would be to help the country come up with a workable diversification model whose recommendations would feed in the draft Seventh National Development Plan (SNDP) as well as the Vision 2030.
Mr Ng’andwe was optimistic that copper prices would soon rebound.
“There is optimism, if you look at the demand for copper, it is only that China is not doing very well, China is our major commodity importers, there is still demand for copper, the construction industry is still booming,” he said.
