Analysis Of Zambia Mining Act

Zambia is a landlocked country in Southern Africa with abundant mineral resourcesrichly endowed by nature, especially for the copper resource, it is the fourth largest copperproducing nation in the world with a reputation of the kingdom of copper. In addition,other resources like cobalt, tin and gem also have abundant reserve in Zambia. Fromancient times to the present, mining industry has played a vital role in the history of thedevelopment of Zambian national economy. At present, Zambian national economy stillmainly depends on the development of mining industry. Therefore, Zambian governmentwill adjust the policies on mining industry according to the requirements of the economicsituation in different stages and improve the investment environment of the Zambianmining industry by constantly revising and publishing new mining acts. Zambia is the firstcountry in Southern Africa to establish diplomatic relations with China, the relationshipbetween the two countries is close and the friendship is profound. Also, Zambia and Chinaare good cooperative partners in economy. In recent years with the constantly deepeningof the friendship, the two countries have strengthened the cooperation in economy, mainlyin the investment of mining industry. Zambia, with rich copper and cobalt resources, hasstrong complementarities with our country. Moreover, the good investment environmentin Zambia has attracted more and more Chinese mining investors. At present, ourresearches on Zambian mining industry only stay in economic level and the researches onthe mining legislation are quite rare. In particular, the research on the new law, Mines andMineral Development Act,2008is almost a blank. Zambian mining legislation is relativelyadvanced and in lines with the international rules and it is a model of modern mininglegislations, while the mining legislation in our country still remains in the primary stage.Therefore, the research on the Zambian mining legislation has realistic values whether forthe Chinese investment industries or for the mining legislation in our mining industry.Zambia has always attached great importance to the revision and perfection of itsmining acts, the most representative of which is Mines and Mineral Development Act,2008. The legislation system of the act is rigorous and the content is complete. It regulatesthe mining activities mainly in the following three aspects: mining rights institution,system of safety, health and environment and system of royalty payment. Compared withthe mining legislation in our country, the act provides much successful experience for theperfection of the mining legislation in our country. The mining rights institution is the corecontent of the mining act and it mainly refers to the type of mining rights, therequirements to the subject qualification of mining right, the expiration date of the mining right license, how to get mining right and how to transfer the possession of mining right.The legislation of the Zambian Mines and Mineral Development Act,2008takes arelatively loose attitude towards the subject qualification of mining rights in order toencourage foreign investment in Zambian mining industry. According to the mining scaleand mining activity, the act subdivides the types of mining rights into the following types:large-scale prospecting license, small-scale prospecting license, large-scale exploitinglicense, small-scale exploiting license, large-scale germ license, small-scale germ licenseand individual exploiting license. The issues in mining rights institution such as how to getmining right, the expiration date of the mining right license and how to transfer thepossession of mining right are the top priorities in mining legislation, at the same time,they are the parts closely relating to the mining investors. In addition to a perfect andmature mining system, the international community pays more and more attention to thesustainable development of mineral resources and the reduction of environmentalpollution caused by mining industry. Therefore, the system of safety, health andenvironment in modern mining legislation has become another important part in themining acts. We can see from the Zambian mining legislation that Zambia attaches greatimportance to the protection of the environment: the design of system of miningenvironment starts from the source; strictly control the qualification in the environmentalrequirements of the people with mining right from the stage of mining examining andapproving; the overall process of mining activity from that above stage to the stage ofprocessing environment after closing the mines are all under strict supervision andexamination of the Zambian government. The only shortcoming in Zambian mininglegislation is that the regulation of the safety of mines and health of miners are too sketchywith only scattered distributions in the relevant laws of environmental protection, thegovernment should pay more attention to it. Finally, the mining investors are mostconcerned about the benefits, the rate of royalty payment directly relates to the benefits ofthe country and the investors. In recent years, Zambia has increased the rate of royaltypayment, which, to a certain extent, dampens the enthusiasm of the mining investors fromall over the world. But on the whole, the benefits of mining investment in Zambia stillremain the medium level. Seeing throughout the mining legislation in Zambia, especiallyfor the Mines and Mineral Development Act,2008, a model of modern mining legislations,the mining industry in our country should learn from it and draw on the successfulexperience of it. But it still needs to be improved and perfected in the actual operation.