IN SHORT: South Africa attracts just 1% of the $13 billion spent on global mineral exploration annually, leaving a critical pipeline gap for the battery and clean energy minerals the country needs to build processing industries. Anglo American has injected R600 million into the IDC-managed Junior Mining Exploration Fund, bringing it to R1 billion, as industry leaders at the South Africa Investment Conference 2026 called for urgent action on exploration, tenure security, and regulatory predictability.
South Africa is receiving only 1% of global mineral exploration investment despite holding among the world’s largest reserves of platinum group metals, manganese, and chrome, leaving the country without the pipeline of new discoveries needed to build the battery and clean energy supply chains it is targeting, industry leaders warned at the South Africa Investment Conference 2026. Anglo American’s R600 million injection into the IDC-managed Junior Mining Exploration Fund, announced by Kumba Iron Ore CEO Mpumi Zikalala, brings the fund to R1 billion and represents the most concrete capital commitment to solving the exploration gap.
- Globally, $13 billion was spent on mineral exploration in 2023. Africa attracted 10% of that total. South Africa received just 1%, a figure that points to a structural underinvestment problem well beyond mining output.
- The Junior Mining Exploration Fund, originally seeded with R400 million and managed by the Industrial Development Corporation, has been boosted to R1 billion following Anglo American’s R600 million contribution, announced at SAICA 2026.
- Exploration typically takes 13 to 15 years before a mine can be developed, with no guarantee a discovery becomes viable. Without rebuilding the pipeline now, South Africa’s future supply position for battery and clean energy markets is at risk.
- Minerals Council South Africa CEO Mzila Mthenjane identified “soft infrastructure” as equally critical to hard infrastructure: security of tenure, a functional cadastral system, and predictable regulation are prerequisites for capital flow.
- ARM CEO Phillip Tobias said the company is already repositioning toward transition minerals: platinum group metals for catalytic converters and potential hydrogen applications, manganese from Black Rock Mine for battery storage, chrome from Nkomati, and a stake in Surge Copper in Canada.
- Minerals Minister Gwede Mantashe pushed for beneficiation: more value-add at the point of production rather than continuing to export largely unprocessed material.
- AECI chair Philisiwe Sibiya argued South Africa is better positioned as a regional processing and industrial hub than as a standalone competitor, given that lithium, cobalt, and copper sit in neighbouring countries rather than within South African borders.
Africaspoint has previously covered South Africa’s mining investment dynamics: BHP’s $246bn warning to South Africa laid out the hard message global miners are sending Pretoria, while 4 African Nations Lead Global Mining Investment Race showed South Africa’s leading position in the Africa Mining Destinations ranking, a contrast that makes the 1% exploration share figure even sharper.
The Bigger Picture: The 1% exploration figure is the most damning data point in South Africa’s critical minerals story. It is not a reflection of what lies underground. South Africa’s platinum group metal and manganese reserves are among the most significant on earth. It is a reflection of investor confidence in the above-ground environment: tenure security, permitting timelines, regulatory predictability, and infrastructure reliability. Anglo American’s R600 million into the Junior Mining Exploration Fund is meaningful but it funds early-stage exploration, not the systemic reforms that determine whether discoveries become mines. Sibiya’s regional hub thesis is strategically sound: South Africa cannot supply all the battery minerals it needs, but it can supply the industrial capacity, capital markets, and logistics that turn regional mineral deposits into globally competitive processed product. That repositioning requires policy coherence at exactly the moment the current policy environment is most uncertain.
Source: Business Day
