Good Today. Better Tomorrow

Namdeb’s operations are located within the Tsau //Kaeb (Sperrgebiet) National Park, adjacent to the Orange River and Namibian Islands Marine Protected Areas. The unique location of Namdeb’s diamond mining operations encourages a responsible and proactive environmental management approach and as such the Company prides itself with a rehabilitation plan which is aligned with the park’s Land Use Plan.
This plan makes provision for rehabilitating areas disturbed by mining, to be used in future for nature-based tourism as well as conservation areas, and has made it possible for Namdeb to adopt concurrent rehabilitation practices. At the same time Namdeb continues to invest in numerous conservation, monitoring and ecological historical programmes.
This contributes to minimizing the potential impact of its operations on the environment in which it operates. In this feature, we elaborate more on this impactful work and how it enriches Namdeb’s legacy through the sharing of two Environmental graduates’ personal stories. Megameno Mutaleni and Dene Kisting were both born in Oranjemund and schooled at the prestigious Oranjemund Private School (OPS).
Interestingly both have followed into the footsteps of their parents in choosing Namdeb as the Employer of Choice. Megameno is the son of Nyl Mutaleni, who worked in the Engineering department whilst his mother, Paula is employed at the Namdeb Hospital. Dene’s father, Danny currently works in the Security Technical Services and her grandfather, Isak Cloete, previously worked in Allied Services.
As Namdeb prioritises implementation of the new Long-Term Plan, which extends its Life of Mine from 2022 to 2042, Megameno and Dene join the consortium of other Namdeb graduates in playing their part of ensuring a better tomorrow!

Meet Megameno Mutaleni

Born and raised in Oranjemund as the 3rd of 4 children, Megameno Mutaleni couldn’t have asked for a better place to grow up. He admits that with both his parents having been employed by the company for over 30 years, Namdeb has played a major part in forming his life journey and acknowledges that the diamond-built town of Oranjemund provides diverse facilities and amenities as well as a notable sense of safety and security for children to comfortably pursue their dreams.
Megameno’s journey started at OPS, where he attended his primary school and later moved to secondary school in Windhoek. He developed his passion for geography and environmental studies, which fueled his further studies in the field of Geo-information science with a focus on geography and environmental studies. After completing his studies with the University of Namibia, Megameno was afforded the opportunity to jump start his career with Namdeb.
This placed him at the forefront of Namdeb’s commitment to minimize any negative impact that the operations may potentially have on the environment. Namdeb’s Environmental management plans aligns to the global call for action to minimize environmental impacts which in turn supports decarbonization with sustainability at its core.
As the Environmental Officer at Namdeb’s Orange River Mines (ORM), Megameno contributes to implementing the environmental management plans for both Doberas and Sendelingsdrif mins, advocating environmental awareness and maintaining the ISO 14001: 2015 certification. He is also responsible for water quality monitoring of surface and ground water as well as effluent monitoring, conducting self-check assurance audits, updating and maintaining ISO 14001 documentation, and implementing Namdeb’s Ecological restoration programme at Sendelingsdrif – ORM.

Restoration through Rehabilitation

Megameno says that the ecological restoration programme at Namdeb, which he is involved in, is a result of addressing the significant potential impact that the operations may have on the endangered Juttadinteria albata (a succulent endemic to the area) and other red listed species. Implementation of the programme is dependent on the concurrent rehabilitation that is integrated into the mine plan – which is indicative of the leadership commitment to rehabilitation.
Namdeb’s comprehensive rehabilitation programme contributes to the preservation and leveraging the legacy of over 100 years of mining in Tsau //Kaeb (Sperrgebiet) National Park. Maintenance of the nursery which ensures good survival rates of protected species is one of the key focus processes of the progamme. The programme also includes coordinating the revegetation of the readily available backfilled and landscaped areas, and taking care of these now sensitive areas to ensure survival of these target species. In 2021 alone, a total of 39.75Ha of land has been restored at Orange River mines through the concurrent landscape rehabilitation contract.
Megameno is proud of being part of the Namdeb team that continuously seeks ways of becoming more eco-conscious through the identification of ways that mitigate environmental risks. Some of the challenges experienced pertain to the fact that given mine’s location in the National Park, the presence of the animals such as baboons make it very difficult to maintain reasonable survival rates of the plants and to restore the area post mining. The baboon challenge presents one of the significant examples of human/wildlife conflict in the area.
Finding innovative ways to deal with such situations is however what drives people like Megameno to wake up every day and ensure Namdeb is Good Today. Better Tomorrow.

Dene’s Diamond Dream

Dene Kisting, like Megameno, is a direct product of the positive influence that Namibian diamonds have had on so many fronts and a true epitome of the continuous Namdeb legacy. Dene completed both her primary and secondary schooling at Oranjemund Private School. She too has fond earlier memories and attributes a significant part of her career journey, growth and development to Namdeb. Dene has a lot to share and recounts the company having played an integral part in her success she further adds that Namdeb has laid a foundation that cannot be swayed. Her father, Danny, is part of the proud history of Namdeb, having started his apprenticeship as an electrician in the early 90’s, and is still working for Namdeb.
Her grandfather also worked for the company, at the then allied services as a supervisor. It was therefore inevitable that Dene would return to Oranjemund after completing her studies to live her Namibian diamond dream just as her father and grandfather did before her. Dene specialized in Geography and Environmental Studies and has a Masters in Urban and Regional Planning from Stellenbosch University.
She joined Namdeb as a planning clerk and hospital receptionist before landing her current role as an Environmental Officer in the Southern Coastal Mine (SCM). Dene maintains that the Environmental section is responsible for developing, maintaining and continuously improving the environmental management system, which is aligned to ISO140001:2015 international standards.
Part of the section’s responsibilities is to ensure non-negotiable compliance to legal permitting, engaging with internal and external stakeholders on matters pertaining to the activities of all our operations. She further adds that her role as the SCM Environmental Officer, she oversees these processes for SCM and is also involved in site monitoring (in accordance with legal permitting requirements), internal audits (aligned to the ISO140001:2015 standard) and engages various departments to make sure that standards are in place. She is also responsible for hosting stakeholders on site and engage others accordingly to build awareness.

Embracing Circular Economy

The Environmental section at Namdeb has provided Dene with the opportunity to put to use what she has learned academically. She asserts that although she agrees that academics and practical work are two completely different worlds, through her field work she has learnt that the two are not mutually exclusive. Namdeb’s ways of mining is very different to anything she has ever done and finds it exciting to tackle the daily challenges faced in the mining areas.
The funding and implementation of rehabilitation programmes form part of Namdeb’s Environmental management focus. This work allows for the appointment of on-site waste management contractors that are involved in the collection, segregation, storage and to a limited extent disposal of Namdeb’s waste streams.
Dene expresses her pride and passion of the work done at SCM on the waste sites as this is demonstrable effort of progressively moving towards a circular economy approach. Circular is defined as “a model of production and consumption, which involves sharing, leasing, reusing, repairing, refurbishing and recycling existing materials and products as long as possible”. It tackles global challenges such as climate change, biodiversity loss, waste, and pollution.
Dene further confirms that within the Namdeb context, there are different waste and environmental procedures applied on the mining sites which address the internal governing of the environment and requirements. There are also waste management procedures that provide guidelines on how to dispose of waste in a safe and environmentally friendly way.
As part of Namdeb’s concurrent rehabilitation approach, sites make use of a different-coloured skips coding system that allows for the separation/segregation of waste, and thus making disposal easier to manage and in so doing, reducing waste to the landfill. In support of implementing the long-term plan, Namdeb’s environmental team ensures that the sites can accommodate envisaged future generated waste and that mitigation measures which address potential impacts on the environment are instituted.
Namdeb continues to collaborate with key stakeholders on environmental matters of mutual concern both for its operations and within the park. Dene feels privileged to be exposed to these arrangements which include engagements and collaborative efforts within the Namibian De Beers Group of Companies. In this regard, Namdeb together with its sister company Debmarine Namibia recently co-funded and conducted a joint benthic vessel-based scientific survey.
The aim of the survey was to implement an impact and recovery monitoring programme for benthic macro-fauna and rock lobster (during and after mining). The data time series is crucial as it allows for both entities to demonstrate seabed recovery as part of the marine mining license to operate.

The Pride of Namibia’s Mining

Namdeb remains steadfast to its environmental commitments. The environmental management practices, outlined in this feature, are an example of delivering on requirements that leverage the Protecting the Natural World under the Building Forever sustainability pillar.
Furthermore, the dedication of employees like Megameno and Dene, contributes to Namdeb being the Pride of Namibia’s Mining – to 2050 and beyond.