International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science (IJRISS) |Volume VI, Issue XI, November 2022|ISSN 2454-6186
Tinashe Gumbo
All Africa Conference of Churches (AACC), Kenya
Abstract: Research to date on local content development (LCD) has been largely focused on gas and oil with little being said regarding other sectors such as platinum mining. The definitions offered by different scholars with regards to LCD have also been biased towards economic and political perspectives at the expense of the social aspect of the subject. Such narrow understanding of LCD has only considered the interest of the private sector and the host government while neglecting the potential input of mining communities in the mining value chain. This paper, focuses on community-based activism and LCD in the platinum mining communities of Zimbabwe. Through desk research, participant observation and key informant interviews conducted targeting community-based activists, it was found out that mining communities view LCD mainly as a social justice issue infusing it in the discourse of mining frames that embrace the economic, political and social dimensions of LCD. LCD and social justice advocate socio-politico-economic fairness, equity and equality and indeed both converge on egalitarianism. The paper contributes to knowledge on LCD and community activism. It recommends that mining policy and legislative frameworks be sensitive to social implications of mining on local mining communities.
Key Words: Local Content Development, Social Justice, Mining Sector
I. INTRODUCTION
The work of Grossman (1981) provided the initial and greatest significant instinctive foundation for the cademic work on local content. It presented an original framework on the subject (Richardson, 1993; Veloso, 2001 and 2006in Ado 2013:138). One notes the contested definition of Local Content Development (LCD) in the mining sector where focus has always been restricted to economic and political aspects at the expense of the social perspective. The paper thus, contributes to the debate on the meaning of LCD and the factors that affect its implementation by arguing for the inclusion of a social justice perspective to the concept with examples being drawn mainly from the platinum mining communities of Zimbabwe which are Mhondoro-Ngezi; Zvishavane and Shurugwi where the Zimplats, Mimosa and Unki Platinum mines are the mainly actors respectively.
Different stakeholders, including academics, mining companies, mining communities and government have varying opinions regarding the definition and implications of LCD. This paper argues that LCD (local content requirements or measures or policies) is a social justice issue that can be taken up by activist-authors as a contribution to the social movement