The recent flurry of action by the government to stem the threatened loss of thousands of jobs on the mines is both timely and necessary. The crisis seems to have persuaded Mineral Resources Minister Ngoako Ramatlhodi to jettison his roughhouse approach of 10 days ago, when he suspended the licence of a major coal mine because of suspicions that its planned retrenchment of 394 workers was illegal.Faced with a considerable backlash, Ramatlhodi lifted the suspension and convened talks with the mining houses and unions on how to save jobs as mining buckles under the weight of plunging commodity prices, rising costs, power shortages, labour unrest and lack of policy certainty.The talks did not yield concrete results but they are a beginning. At the very least, continuing discussions might cool temperatures and improve the adversarial relationship between the three parties - essential if compromises are to be achieved to save jobs.In the longer run, the survival of mining in South Africa will depend on employees and owners finding each other by linking wage increases with heightened productivity.This is unpalatable to the unions right now, but will ultimately prove to be essential.South Africa is blessed with enormous mineral wealth but the extraction costs are starting to become prohibitive for investors - who have the option of putting their money into other minerals-rich countries.Increasing mechanisation and capital flight will be the consequences of a business-as-usual approach to mining in South Africa.In the short term, the elephant in the room is a threatened strike in the gold sector, in which the National Union of Mineworkers and its rival, the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union, have been trying to outdo each other with wage-hike demands of between 80% and 100%.A repeat of last year's devastating platinum strike, which wiped billions of rands off our GDP, would be too much to endure...