Mining

How will technology evolve the sector?

Mining is a high-risk industry, both from an economic and a human cost perspective. For Australia’s mining companies, the challenge is to reduce costs and enhance production while ensuring the safety of workers. Technology has proven to be a key tool for achieving both objectives through delivering remote operating capabilities, while also enabling the deployment of comprehensive sensing capabilities that are painting a clearer picture of mining operations, especially in terms of managing equipment maintenance and monitoring environmental impacts.

The challenge now is to continue to build a strong technology skills capability while strengthening capabilities in managing complex automated environments. Miners must also develop data analytics skills to ensure they are driving maximum efficiency from operations and maximising yields.

1.1. How will the demand for mining workers evolve over the next decade?

Today’s mining workforce is highly vulnerable to the wave of technological change that is likely to occur over the next 10 years. Its vulnerability comes from the nature of the tasks workers typically perform in this sector. Work is geared heavily towards automatable tasks such as physical interactions, analysing routine data and capturing and monitoring information.

Our analysis projects a significant drop in demand for many of the highest employing occupations in the mining sector, particularly truck drivers and welders and flame cutters, whose numbers we predict to fall by more than 10% by 2028.

By comparison, occupations such as mining engineers and geologists and geophysicists are less vulnerable to automation. As new technology is integrated into business processes, the focus on critical and creative thinking in these roles means demand for these positions will rise over the coming decade.

The future of jobs and skills needed

How widespread are skills shortfalls for new entrants to this sector?

Although we predict a net decline in demand for mining sector workers overall, productivity gains will mean a reorganising of the workforce around the roles that continue to add value alongside advanced technology.

That shift implies pervasive skills gaps to be overcome, chief among them are critical thinking and speaking. We found that 60% of the most likely talent pool were lacking in these skills. This sector is amongst the most exposed to the breadth of the reskilling challenge in terms of the proportion of vacancies with skills shortfalls.

The shift in demand for skills in the sector leaves significant shortfalls to bridge in some areas, but not all. In the most exposed occupations, the most likely talent pool to fill new positions requiring programming skills is 53% short of the level it requires, for technology design skills it is 37% short. But on the whole, the learning curve for skills demanded is less steep in the mining sector than for many other sectors in our study, meaning the available pool of workers are relatively well placed to adapt to new technologies.