Explanation:

South Africa ranks top in the mining of gold. This country is long been known to be the largest producer of gold in Africa. Its operations in gold mining begun in the 1880s when gold was first discovered in Witwatersrand area in the Gauteng Province. This discovery led to a gold rush in the area; as a result many more places were discovered for gold mining. For many years until 2006, South Africa was the world's dominant gold producer, but recently other countries have surpassed South Africa: China, Russia, Canada, the United States, Peru and Australia.