The discussions taking place at the North West Mining Conference held in Rustenburg have highlighted the need to support small-scale mining companies. While these companies have many challenges ranging from funding and support, female junior miners say their challenges are extreme, as only male junior miners get to be afforded opportunities they could also benefit from.
Pauline Pitso and Tshidi Mahiwa are women extracting platinum and marbles respectively amongst other commodities in the province.
“If there is a big project that needs big machines they say they cannot give it to us, the women. They want to give it to our male counterparts whereby we say them, let’s stop this now, we are here. We’ve got skills, we’ve got potential. We can do this,” says Pitso.
“They don’t always open doors and accommodate us in order to empower us to be fully capacitated and be able to be independent and stand on our own,” says Mahiwa.
