The Ministry of Mines and Petroleum (MoMP)

Current Projects

International Cooperation Pages

Partnerships with development institutions

Partnerships with international development institutes and governments is a crucial element of Ethiopia’s Home Grown Economic Agenda as it relates to the mining and petroleum sectors. The MoMP has formed partnerships with the following development institutions: 

  • The Western Australia School of Mines
  • Colorado School of Mines
  • United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO)
  • African Development Bank (AfDB)
  • Intergovernmental Forum (IGF)
  • Curtin University and Tulu Kapi Gold Mines Company

More detail on each of these follows below.

A new International Cooperation Unit with development institutions

The MoMP has also recently established a new unit to manage grants and international cooperation activities. This is a result of  growing interest from potential donors and institutions to contribute to various reform and capacity building projects. The Ministry is currently designing and setting up the office space for the new unit where it can engage with partners and donors effectively.

Western Australia School of Mines

The Western Australia School of Mines specializes in mining-related subjects like, for example, Mining Engineering and Metallurgical Engineering, and operates under the banner of Curtin University in the historic mining town of Kalgoorie, Western Australia. 

The MoMP is collaborating with the Western Australia School of Mines to establish school of Mines in the Oromia Region in Ethiopia. This new school will help to upskill Oromia’s mining labour force.

Colorado School of Mines

Colorado School of Mines is an American public research university based in Golden, Colorado focused on science and engineering, that aims to  address the great challenges society faces today—particularly those related to the Earth, energy and the environment.

The Colorado School of Mines has joined forces with the MoMP and the GSE to establish a centre of excellence. The centre of excellent will focus on producing standardised geodata information and upskilling Ethiopia’s mining labour force.

UNIDO

The United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) is the specialized agency of the United Nations that promotes industrial development for poverty reduction, inclusive globalization and environmental sustainability.

170 states are members of UNIDO – as of 1 April 2019. They regularly discuss and decide UNIDO’s guiding principles and policies in the sessions of the Policymaking Organs.

UNIDO’s mission is to promote and accelerate inclusive and sustainable industrial development (ISID) in Member States. UNIDO is working with the MoMP to establish a marble school in Benishangul-Gumuz region.

AfDB

The African Development Bank (AfDB) is a multilateral development finance institution. Its goal is to spur sustainable economic development and social progress and reduce poverty in its regional member countries.

It does this by mobilizing and allocating resources for investment as well as providing policy advice and technical assistance to support development efforts.

AfDB is helping the MoMP with capacity building and to standardize Ethiopia’s existing legal system with respect to mining. It is also helping the MoMP to produce:

  • A model mining agreement
  • A company grievance toolkit
  • A beneficiation strategy
  • A local content policy framework for Mining and Petroleum

Intergovernmental Forum

The Intergovernmental Forum on Mining, Minerals, Metals and Sustainable Development (IGF) supports more than 60 nations committed to leveraging mining for sustainable development to ensure negative impacts are limited and financial benefits are shared. It is devoted to optimizing the benefits of mining to achieve poverty reduction, inclusive growth, social development and environmental stewardship.

The IGF is focused on improving resource governance and decision making by governments working in the sector. It provides a number of services to members including: in-country assessments; capacity-building and individualized technical assistance; guidance documents and conferences which explore best practices and provide an opportunity to engage with industry and civil society.

The International Institute for Sustainable Development has served as Secretariat for the IGF since October 2015. Core funding is provided by the Government of Canada.

The MoMP is drawing on the IGF’s expertise to help with issues and projects like

  • Standardizing and reforming the mining taxation system and the fiscal regime more generally
  • Mining revenue management
  • Introducing a one-door policy for investment

Curtin University and Tulu Kapi Gold Mines Company (TKGM)

The MoMP has a memorandum of understanding with Australia’s Curtin University (home of the Western Australian School of Mines and the Tulu Kapi Gold Mines Company (TKMG) a subsidiary of KEFI Minerals, to work on:

  • Filling in some of the capacity gaps in mining and petroleum engineering in Ethiopia
  • Resource reserve estimation
  • Mining and petroleum economics

The Extractives Hub

The MoMP has begun working with the online knowledge repository The Extractives Hub, in order to identify international experts who can review Ethiopia’s extractives polices and provide technical support and resources. 

The Extractives Hub is primarily an information aggregator specializing in extractives: it aggregates the latest analysis, reports and data onto one platform. In addition it also provides government ministries with custom research and short-term technical assistance. 

To visit the Extractives Hub online, click the button below.

International sector training events

The MoMP has also collaborated with international partners by taking part in international sector training events. Recent events include:

  • The ‘Formalization and Inclusive Governance of Artisanal and Small-scale Gold Mining (ASGM)’ sector training which took place from 15-23 July 2018 in Migori, Kenya.
  • The International Conference on Artisanal and Small-scale Mining and Quarrying which took place from 11-13 September 2018, in Livingstone, Zambia
  • The Yukon Fellowship on ASM Formalization, a high-level policymaking mission bringing together 12 fellows from 5 different countries (Ethiopia, Ghana, Guyana, Colombia and Ecuador) between 1-15 September 2018, in the Yukon, Canada

Study missions

The MoMP has also conducted  a number of study missions to other countries in recent years, with the purpose of peer learning, knowledge sharing and collaboration. Destinations  include:

Windhoek, Namibia (December 2018 and February 2019)

The first of these study missions was to attend a forum on supporting effective mining local procurement strategies and best practices in Namibia (December 5-7, 2018). Hosted by the Namibia University of Science and Technology (NUST), 3 senior experts from the MoMP participated in the mission.. This allowed participants to enhance their knowledge base with respect to  effective mining strategies and best practices especially with respect to artisanal mining. The methodologies and substantial number of resources shared and collected during the study mission shall support the development of the ASM national strategy. During the second mission (February 7-8, 2019), the Minister and GSE Chief Geologist visited the department of Mining and Process Engineering to learn about type of curriculum is provided, type of facilities/equipment are available in the faculty and understand how the department helps solving ASM related challenges. The mission was completed by a visit at the Ministry of Mines and Energy of Namibia to discuss cooperation areas between Ethiopia and Namibia and linkages between universities and geological surveys.

Khartoum, Sudan (March 2019)

During this mission, a field visit of ASGM and LSGM sites was organized by the Sudanese Ministry of Minerals, through the Sudanese Mineral Resources Company. The MoMP’s team learned from Sudan’s experiences and approach to ASM gold mining, federal and regional coordination, and institutional organization of the ASM sector. Meetings were also conducted to look at cooperation areas between the Ministry of Mines of Sudan and Ethiopia.  

Chile and Peru (July 2019)

The MoMP Minister himself took part in the study mission to Peru and Chile where he was joined by two Regional representatives and two MoMP staff members. The objectives of the mission were: 

  • To learn as much as possible from Peru’s experience in the following areas: 
    • How Peru structure and administer mineral rights and licences
    • How Peru created and manages their cadastre system 
    • How Peru developed its geoscience and geospatial database systems 
    • Peru’s institutional structure, roles and competencies for the environmental and social performance management of projects. 
    • How Peru management of social conflicts in the mining sector (between communities and companies, and between LSM and ASM)
    • How Peru  employs public engagement and consultation in the licensing process and throughout the mine life cycle. 
  • Promote the exchange of ideas in both directions about good practices in the formalization process of artisanal miners.  
  • To learn about Chile’s ENAMI model. The topics covered during this part of the mission included: 
    • Credit incentives for small and medium-scale mining 
    • Technical assistance to mining cooperatives
    • Provision of smelting and refining services for metals
    • Value added model achieved through production plants
    • Special purchasing mechanisms for the production of small-scale mining

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