On Earth, mining originated in prehistoric times, maybe some fifty thousand years BC. The materials thus gained were used to make jewelry and basic tools. However, this was only possible because Earth was a living planet - the materials needed to sustain life were plentiful in the environment.
Here, on a planet devoid of life, our whole survival depends on technology. Earth had liquid water, an oxygen-rich atmosphere, and substantial reserves of biologically accessible carbon, iron, and various other resources necessary for advanced life. That is a luxury we no longer have. We need to find sustenance elsewhere - by processing the atmosphere, the rock and eventually, even the asteroids and comets in outer space. Developing efficient mining and prospecting techniques is a necessity, and our ability to use Earth-based knowledge is limited - there are no coal beds or oil fields, because there is no life; the regolith is very different compared to Earths, because there is no life. Deposits are hard to find, because there is no running water - we don’t even know if there are any significant resources, because there are few mechanisms that deposit resources in one place.