Yes, there is no ‘value’ in poverty, and nobody is advocating that Wild Coast Communities should be doomed to a life of poverty. But it is not as simple a matter as saying the mining will produce x tons of titanium over 25 years sold at x amount while tourism will produce x amount of visitors, and
generate x amount of capital, therefore mining is preferable (or not) to eco- tourism or vice versa. A selective economic view that equates ‘value’ purely in terms of market price has contributed to a world system where the poorest 3 billion people in the world ( more than half of humanity) only
share 1.4% of global wealth( Institute of Policy Studies 2004), as such a view neglects to include many aspects of eco-system benefits that contribute to improved life quality. Degrading eco-systems that the poor depend upon
has immediate impoverishing repercussions for the poor and exacerbates poverty.
Even if mining was shown to be more ‘economically profitable’ than alternative forms of development, a primary consideration is ‘who will benefit?’. Alternatively, what sort of development would bring the most economic opportunities to the greatest number of people? Indications are
that, under current mining policy, very little of the benefits of mining will go back to those communities who will loose the benefits of the land they presently occupy and have occupied for centuries.
One also has to ask, in the event of mining being approved, what vestiges of ‘development’ would be left after the 25 year lifespan of the mine. South Africa has many ‘ghost towns’ where ‘development’ that has been centred around mining collapses once mining operations wrap up.

In terms of environmental recovery, there is no case study that has been undertaken to indicate that rehabilitation as proposed by the mining company will be successful or even possible, and every indication that the mining will lead to irreversible, large scale, environmental damage of an
internationally recognised ‘botanical hotspot’ which is still remarkably intact and pristine.

Incidentally, a cost benefit analysis conducted as part of the Wild Coast Conservation and Development Plan indicates that in the long term, well planned eco -tourism development of the region would bring far greater and
more sustainable economic prosperity, with benefits spread over a wider population, than mining.
Wild Coast Communities who live on the land proposed for mining are strongly opposed to the use of the land they occupy for mining, as it is currently advocated. For anyone to disregard this is, in my view, tantamount to perpetuating ‘forced removals’ of the apartheid era.’

Australian musicians Paul Kelly and Kev Carmody sing of the struggle by Aboriginals against land exploitation in the song ‘From Little Things, Big Things Grow’. Isn’t it ironic that South Africa’s Pondo people are now engaged in a similar struggle against an Australian mining company?

Val Payn