Johannesburg — STATE-owned mining company African Exploration Mining and Finance Corporation gave in yesterday to mounting pressure from wine farmers, environmental and other lobby groups for it to abandon plans to prospect, and possibly mine, in the Cape Winelands.

The withdrawal of its application for rights follows reassurances this week by Department of Mineral Resources director-general Sandile Nogxina, that the government would reject the application.

News last month of African Exploration's application for rights to prospect for tin, zinc, lead, lithium, copper, manganese and silver on the farms angered wine farmers, residents and environmental groups. They voiced concern that mining would disturb eco-diversity, tourism and the quality of local wines .

Concern was also raised that the application process had been flawed from the start, with owners of wine farms and other stakeholders complaining that they were made aware of African Exploration's intentions only just before the deadline for public submissions.

African Exploration chairman Mputumi Damane said yesterday the company had decided to withdraw the application "for strategic business reasons".

"We have just completed an extensive process of reviewing our corporate plans. One of the key outcomes of that process was a decision to reprioritise the areas around the country where we plan to devote our energies," Damane said.

"Like any other business, we operate with limited resources and part of the business plan review process was to shorten the list of areas where we are going to deploy our corporate resources.

"On the basis of the adapted strategic trajectory, we have decided to withdraw the application to the Department of Mineral Resources for prospecting rights in the Western Cape," he said.

The withdrawal was welcomed by those who had lobbied against it.

"We welcome this move to withdraw. We are relieved and this means we can now go back and do what we do best -- making great wines," wine estate owner Gary Jordan said.

Inge Kotze of the Worldwide Fund for Nature also welcomed the withdrawal but urged more vigilance by civil society. The episode called for people to "watch out for these kinds of applications by mining companies", Kotze said.

The storm over the application comes in the wake of growing protests in Limpopo against the granting of unconditional rights to Coal of Africa to mine in the Mapungubwe area, one of seven of SA's World Heritage Sites .