The Zimbabwean government on Tuesday renewed its ban on alluvial and riverbed mining to curb environmental degradation.
The government first announced the ban in 2020, but the practice has continued unabated over the past years.
Addressing a post-Cabinet media briefing, Jenfan Muswere, minister of Information, Publicity and Broadcasting Services, said the Cabinet directed at its Tuesday meeting that riverbed mining be banned with immediate effect.
“The Cabinet noted that ever since its commencement in 2011 across the country’s rural provinces, large-scale and mechanical alluvial mining or riverbed mining has resulted in water pollution, siltation, degradation of river channels, and disruption of riverine ecosystems,” he said.
Speaking at the same event, Minister of Lands, Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Rural Development Anxious Masuka, who is also the chairperson of the interministerial committee on mining and environment, said law enforcement agencies will be out in full force to enforce the ban.
“Although we have the legal underpinning to ensure that mining can take place in a legalized environment including alluvial mining, there is a class of illegal miners that go onto a river and begin to mine whether as artisanal or mechanical miners,” Masuka said. “We want to ban alluvial mining and in banning it means we have to resource the ministries, the departments, and agencies that are mandated with ensuring enforcement of laws.”
He added deterrent penalties will also be imposed on offenders, including forfeiture of mining equipment.