The Zimbabwe Consolidated Diamond Company (ZCDC), the state run company that manages diamond mining operations at the Marange fields said that it has received the necessary clearances from the Environmental Management Agency (EMA). According to reports in the media, the company’s CEO Moris Mpofu said that operations that were temporarily halted by a court order earlier this month will be “resumed with immediate effect”.

It may be recalled that the Zimbabwe High Court had, in early August, ordered the Company to halt mining, saying that it had not received the necessary permits regarding the Environmental Impact Assessment. The Court order came in a case that was filed by a community organization, the Marange Development Trust, supported by Zimbabwe Environmental Law Association, which called for the stoppage saying that the ZCDC licence did not have requisite EMA approval.

ZCDC was set up by the government in March 2016 after the state took over the mining operations in Marange that had hitherto been run by private companies.

While some of the companies have filed legal challenges against the takeover, and operations in those areas have come to a halt, ZCDC has been conducting mining and processing activities in areas from where the original licencees have not raised disputes regarding the handing over of the site to the government.