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AUGUST 2014 | Resource Global Network
127
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Minority engagement
As the MINAD’s targets suggest, increasing
diversity within the mining industry is one
of MTEC’s key goals. It offers a Diversity
Scholarship to students from minority
groups in an attempt to make opportunities
equal for all.“The Australian mining industry
employs a workforce of about a quarter
of a million people – but only 12 to 18 per
cent of them are female and only 3 per cent
indigenous,” Dr Lind explains.
“There is a particular shortage of these
minority groups at the supervisory and
professional levels of companies. The
Diversity Scholarship is targeted to remove
financial impediments that might have
prevented minority students from enrolling,
but also to help make them feel valued – to
show them that we of the minerals industry
are fully behind them.”
The lack of women in the minerals industry
stems back to the fact that relatively few
girls study engineering subjects at school
and university – “Only 12 per cent of all
engineering students in Australia are female,”
says Dr Lind. So to address that problem
MTEC supports Robogals, a student-run
organisation that aims to increase female
participation in engineering, science and
technology through initiatives aimed at girls
of primary and secondary school age.
For women of university age and older,
MTEC is collaborating with BHP Billiton to
hold three gender diversity networking
luncheons over August and September.
These will bring together engineering
students, academics and women with senior
positions in MCA member companies to
discuss the gender inequality issue. “We
want to try to understand what impediments
are preventing women from entering the
minerals industry and what solutions might
exist for achieving better representation of
women in mining companies,” says Dr Lind.
The luncheons will be held at The University
of Queensland on 12 August; The University
of Western Australia on 20 August; and
The University of New South Wales on 3
September.The bad news is that education
reforms which, subject to the passage of
legislation, might come into effect from
2016 could serve to further impede minority
students’ access to minerals education
programs. “If fee deregulation becomes law,
universities will be able to charge whatever
they like for any one of their courses,” Dr Lind
explains.
“Because minerals education courses are
particularly high-cost to deliver, it’s our worry
that students will be asked to make a very
high contribution to access those programs
and that this would make them think twice
before enrolling on a mining engineering,
metallurgy or mineral geosciences degree.
We’re not sure how this will impact student
behaviour yet, but it’s possible that minority
students in particular would be discouraged
from pursuing such a qualification if enrolling
meant taking on substantial long-term debt.”