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The amount of gold produced by South Africa has fallen by 80%, plunging from 620 tonnes in 1988 to 97 tonnes in 2023.
This doesn’t mean there’s no gold left in the ground. PwC reported in 2023 that South Africa still had 68-million troy ounces of gold reserves, the equivalent of 27 years of production.
However, extraction has become punishingly expensive as mines have become deeper to reach remaining deposits.
As a result, hundreds of gold mines have been closed. The Auditor-General said in 2022 that of the estimated 6,100 closed mines in SA, at least 700 were old gold mines.
Although the mines are supposed to be sealed, many are not. An informal economy has grown around them, with former miners and other workers extracting residual gold under hazardous conditions. Many of these miners, known as zama zamas, operate without permits.
Mining minister Gwede Mantashe said in January that SA lost R60-billion to illicit trade in 2024.