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The mining business is dominated by men, with few women at the top. The situation is considerably worse in Africa, where women are rarely given the opportunity to lead mining companies. In many African mining enterprises, women mostly serve as the head of the culinary department, the head of accounting, and other lower-level positions.
However, a few women are breaking through the glass ceiling in the mining industry as CEOs and even owners. Mpumi Zikalala from South Africa is one such woman.
She is the CEO of Kumba Iron Ore, South Africa’s largest iron ore company. According to Mining Review, the firm owns and runs the Sishen and Kolomela mines in the Northern Cape, as well as the Saldanha Bay port.
Zikalala was previously the managing director of De Beers Managed Operations. Her current position places her among the few women in high executive roles in the mining and commodities industry.
Zikalala, a Chemical Engineering graduate of the University of Witwatersrand and a graduate of the London Business School Emerging Leaders Programme, joined De Beers in 2001 as a process engineer at the Cullinan diamond mine.
In 2007, she became the De Beers Group’s first female General Manager (GM), and in 2010, she was appointed GM of the Group’s Voorspoed mine in the Free State. She rose through the ranks to become senior vice-president of De Beers Sightholder Sales South Africa, which sells all De Beers Group production in the country.
Furthermore, she was named deputy CEO of De Beers Consolidated Mines in 2017 before becoming the first head of De Beers Managed Operations in 2019. During her reign, De Beers launched one of its largest investments, the $2 billion Venetia Underground Project (VUP).
Zikalala is a Trustee of the University of Johannesburg Trust in addition to her duties as CEO. She is also the chairperson of the South African National AIDS Council’s Private Sector Forum.
When she was appointed CEO of Kumba in 2021, she stated in a statement that her priority will be to continue on Kumba’s outstanding safety and operational performance track record while deepening strategic relationships and unlocking more value from the business.
Zikala recently became the first CEO of a mining business to meet with traditional chiefs in Kuruman, a tiny town in South Africa’s Northern Cape province. She has pledged R1 million ($54,000) for various projects that will benefit the community.
