Chris Fleming has a Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Cape Town in South Africa and has spent much of his 51-year career in research and management. He has authored or co-authored over 90 technical publications, been awarded 14 patents, and contributed to several technical books on various aspects of extractive metallurgy. He has directed research teams and consulted in the industry on many hydrometallurgical projects and operations, particularly in gold leaching and recovery.

He is recognized throughout the industry for his contributions to the commercialization of the carbon-in-pulp and resin-in-pulp processes in gold extraction, as well as for the development of the SART, Augment, and Hannah process for cyanide recovery and the Platsol process for the simultaneous recovery of base metals and platinum group metals by pressure oxidation.[Post meeting synopsis] Whiffers enjoyed an evening of ….

He emigrated with his family to Canada in 1990 to join Lakefield Research, and was intimately associated with the 10-fold growth in that company over the next 15 years. He became General Manager in 1992 and Vice President and Chief Operating Officer when the company was privatized in 1995, through a management buyout from Lakefield’s former owners, Falconbridge Ltd. Lakefield Research Limited grew rapidly over the next six years as a private company, as new laboratory businesses were established in Chile, Brazil, South Africa, Australia and Russia, and this led to the acquisition of Lakefield Research by SGS in 2002. Chris took on the role of Vice President, Global Metallurgy under SGS, with technical responsibility for SGS Minerals’ world wide metallurgy and mineralogy businesses. Chris retired from SGS management in 2012, but continues in the role of SGS Senior Metallurgical Consultant, based in Lakefield.  In 2023, Chris was awarded the prestigious  Canadian Mineral Processor’s (CMP) Lifetime Achievement Award for the outstanding contributions achieved throughout his career to the science of mineral processing.