Botswana is finalising new mining regulations aimed at tightening rules on mineral licence holding, increasing local beneficiation and strengthening citizen participation in the sector, Minerals and Energy Minister Bogolo Kenewendo said.
Speaking at the Future of Mining Summit, Kenewendo said the revised framework builds on amendments to the Mines and Minerals Act that came into force on Oct. 1, 2025, and forms part of broader efforts to support economic diversification at a time of slowing growth.
She said enforcement and compliance in the mining sector would be a priority under the new regime.
“The regulations will establish minimum beneficiation requirements, strengthen local content provisions and support the growth of small-scale mining,” Kenewendo said.
The minister said the reforms were intended to discourage speculative holding of mining licences while ensuring greater value is retained within Botswana through local processing and participation in mining supply chains.
Botswana remains one of the world’s leading diamond producers, but is seeking to diversify into other minerals and increase downstream processing as part of its long-term development strategy.
Kenewendo said the country’s ambitions for a broader minerals sector were captured in the Mineral Resource Development, Exploration and Value Chain Strategy (MRDEEVC), which sets out a roadmap for expanding investment, accelerating exploration and deepening citizen participation.
She said Botswana aimed to become a “world-class exploration destination” and planned to significantly increase non-diamond exploration spending.
“We want to become a world-class exploration destination,” she said.
Kenewendo said the government’s targets included raising non-diamond exploration expenditure to 150 million dollars by 2029 to help identify new mineral resources.
She said the expansion of exploration would be guided by the new legal framework and supported by efforts to improve investor conditions.
A strong mining sector, she said, depends on a steady pipeline of discoveries and bankable projects, but exploration remains one of the most capital-intensive and high-risk stages of the value chain.
“We have not invested in exploration as we needed to,” Kenewendo said.
She said the government was working through the Investment and Exploration Company of Botswana (EICB) to identify sites that could attract and de-risk investment into early-stage projects.
Kenewendo said Botswana was also focusing on improving access to geological data and resource mapping to encourage investment in underexplored areas and support long-term mining development.
She said the broader objective was to unlock mineral potential while building a sustainable pipeline of future projects to support economic diversification.
Kenewendo said the mining policy would also be aligned with the National Development Plan 12 and the Botswana Economic Transformation Programme, with an emphasis on job creation, citizen empowerment, corporate social responsibility and environmental, social and governance standards.
