Every Friday, SAfm’s radio anchor Sakina Kamwendo speaks to Martin Creamer, publishing editor of Engineering News & Mining Weekly. Reported here is this Friday’s At the Coalface transcript:

Kamwendo: South Africa’s important platinum business has been boosted sky high by a new futures exchange.

Creamer: We have been waiting for this futures exchange in China for a long time now. They have decided to go ahead with it. They have done all the work. One of the massive things around it is that it won't only be ingot that is traded, but also sponge. That could make it ready for industry, that could change the fuel cell economics. I have just been at the G20 and B20. I have been driving around in a hydrogen fuel cell Toyota. The CEO from Toyota arrived in a hydrogen fuel cell Toyota. When you hear hydrogen fuel cell, you think platinum. So, if we can start doing it around here and China gets ahead, it will be fantastic for our platinum business and it will be fantastic for our economics. Helping with all this is Sasol and also helping with all of it is Air Products. Helping with all of it, too, is Bambili Energy, which is a woman-owned business that gives the membranes to Bosch, which provides the fuel cell engine. So, it’s a fantastic ecosystem that we need to develop.

Kamwendo:  The global platinum market is expected to return to a supply-demand balance next year.

Creamer: This was coming through from the World Platinum Investment Council. All their calculations point to the fact that the supply demand situation should move away from deficit to a balance in 2016, but they say it is all contingent upon the tariffs. So you know, if those tariffs continue to pop up so unexpectedly, it could set us back again, but hopefully, for the sake of our mining industry, it gets into balance. It is never good to have price spikes and price dips. So, hopefully they will be right, and hopefully we won't have these terrible tariffs popping up all the time.

Kamwendo: Next year’s big Mining Indaba is expected to be the most important ever for the continent of Africa. Why?

Creamer: I tell you why, because it is going to come against the background of this B20 and G20 and I have never seen so many good vibes in all my life. I mean, I have been hopping out there for the last two days. It is just unbelievable and the message all the time is, Africa must work together. We cannot continue as is. You can't have these 54 African countries with the borders and then you have got a road and it stops at the border and then that interferes with all the economics when it comes to critical minerals and metals. You need to have that transmission line going across the border. You need to have regional cooperation. This is what Mining Indaba is going to push like crazy, like they have never done it in their lives before, and this is really the biggest platform in Africa to do it. It is the most informal. It has got the people there who are in politics, but also the people there in private sector, and they can do a lot, next February.

Kamwendo: Thanks very much. Martin Creamer is publishing, editor of Engineering News & Mining Weekly.