Mercury Pollution Due to Small-Scale Gold Mining in the Philippines: An Economic Analysis

The study reviews small-scale gold mining in the Philippines and assesses economically mercury pollution and other development problems of the industry. The end purpose is to suggest measures to address the problems and promote better environmental and overall management of small-scale mining. The study uses secondary data from mining institutions as well as primary data from key informants and small-scale gold miners and processors in the two case study sites.natural resources and environment, environmental issues, environmental management

Entanglements and disentanglements : a posthuman approach to mercury use in artisanal and small-scale gold mining in Antioquia, Colombia : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Social Anthropology at Massey University, Palmerston North, New Zealand

This research uses qualitative research techniques and posthuman theories to investigate the dynamic relationship between artisanal and small-scale gold miners and mercury in the context of Antioquia, Colombia. This is done to contribute to understandings of, and inform potential solutions for, the global environmental problem that is mercury pollution from artisanal and small-scale gold mining (ASGM). Miners come to know mercury through practices, and through these practices, mercury comes to be co-constitutive of an informal ASGM industry. Mercury provides an easy yet profitable mode of gold extraction with limited capital expenditure. Eliminating the use of mercury means a re-constitution of ASGM as a formal industry with higher levels of capital investment, new actors and a shift to a more representational approach to knowing materials. The use of toxic mercury and an increase in the enforcement of mining legislation are framing miners as illegal. Formal, responsible mining is becoming a dominant reality, and informal miners who resent being labelled illegal are working to transition to this reality. Miners’ experiences of this transition vary greatly, and this variation can be explored through the lens of ecological habitus. Many miners are using mercury elimination to perform good citizenship by mining responsibly, introducing a performative aspect to formalisation. Nevertheless, miners still face significant challenges to formalisation. As a result, many miners have had to become subcontractors for large-scale mining companies, entering exploitative relationships with which mercury, through its absence, is complicit. Taking this approach towards understanding the relationship between miners and mercury has helped to resolve the conflict between material and social deterministic views of the practice of mercury use, and linked mercury to a wider political context, which is a necessary consideration for a collaborative approach with miners to eliminate mercury. Keywords: Artisanal and small-scale gold mining; ASGM; mercury; Colombia; anthropology; posthumanism; entanglements; politics of materiality; performativity; informality

Undermining the myths about small-scale mining

Item does not contain fulltextAlong with many other countries, in recent decades the Philippines –have witnessed a dramatic expansion of small-scale mining (SSM), mostly (but not exclusively)in the form of small-scale gold mining. As can be seen in the graph below (figure 1), official gold production fromSSM has repeatedly surpassed that of large-scale metallic mining. While SSM istaking place throughout the country, its presence is particularly dramatic in the Cordillera mountain range in Luzon and in the uplands of eastern Mindanao, with Compostela Valley province acting as the selfproclaimed 'gold mining capital of the Philippines'. Despite this massive expansion, however, SSM continues to be shrouded in controversy and misunderstanding. This short piece offers a view from below, based on long-term research inside the country’s mining areas, andattempts to undermine some of the myths that exist about the sector.14 p

Mercury Pollution Due to Small-Scale Gold Mining in the Philippines: An Economic Analysis

The study reviews small-scale gold mining in the Philippines and economically assesses mercury pollution and other development problems in the industry. The end purpose is to suggest measures to address the problems and promote better environmental and overall management of small-scale mining. The study has used secondary data from mining institutions and primary data from key informants and small-scale gold miners and processors in the two case study sites

Gold-rush in a forested El Dorado: long-term assessment of deforestation and policy issues

Small-scale gold-mining has been the major driver of last decade deforestation within the Guiana Shield, one of the least degraded tropical forests in the world. Its social and environmental impacts are diverse and severe: water pollution due to turbidity and mercury, over-hunting in remote and preserved areas, insecurity, prostitution or malaria expansion. Deforestation is another direct effect of small-scale gold-mining, being also the easiest way of assessing its expansion. Using deforestation maps produced by Hansen et al. (2013) and additional Landsat based dataset during the 90's, we provide a long term assessment of deforestation due to small-scale gold-mining between 1990 and 2014 in the Guiana Shield. Quasi-annual measurements of deforestation over the whole region show a very strong exponential relationship between deforestation due to small-scale gold-mining and gold-prices, explaining its massive increase until years 2012-13, when both prices and deforestation started to drop. This highly dynamic relationship suggests low level of governance at the regional scale and raises the question of the ability of local countries to efficiently limit their level of deforestation in eventual REDD+ like projects. A focus on each country's situation shows very different temporal patterns of deforestation between French Guiana and both Suriname and Guyana. While deforestation in the two last countries follows gold prices from the beginning until the end of the period; small-scale gold-mining activity in French Guiana seems to be sharply increasing until 2004. Then, the pressure of military interventions against illegal mining, helped by a regular monitoring using remote sensing techniques (Mining Activity Observatory managed by the French Forest Service), probably overcomes the price effect. Studying the efficiency of local policy in reducing deforestation and associated carbon emissions is of major importance to assess the ratio between economic costs and environmental benefits of such interventions. Looking at potential deforestation leakages between countries as a response to local management is also a necessity to improve environmental governance at the regional scale. (Texte intégral

An Ethnography of Entanglements: Mercury’s Presence and Absence in Artisanal and Small-scale Gold-mining in Antioquia, Colombia

This paper describes a ‘follow the thing’ methodology as applied to an ethnography of entanglements. This methodology allowed for a materially and politically nuanced understanding of Antioquia, Colombia’s response to mercury pollution. This pollution primarily originates from the Artisanal and Small-Scale Gold Mining (ASGM) industry where mercury is employed in the gold extraction process. In following the mercury, the authors experiment with an ethnography of entanglements. The paper discusses how they address the current lacunae in mining ethnographies by focussing on mining as ‘practice’, going past the provision of technical descriptions of mining and ethnographic descriptions of miners to an ethnography of mining. This ethnographic approach considers the politics of materiality and addresses a lack of attention to the impacts of the presence and absence of materials on social life. Various mining practices in Antioquia illuminate how entanglements between miners and mercury have been co-constitutive of particular modes of ASGM. The paper will also provide examples of ‘negative mercury entanglements’ where efforts have been made to extricate mercury from mining practices. Rather than creating a vacuum, these mercury absences have been generative of new contested symbolic and material arrangements including entrepreneurial and ‘responsible’ mining, debates over miners’ rights, and the creation of new political relationships between ASGM and large-scale mining companies.fals

Re-opening of old gold mines for small scale mining in South Africa - the process of creating a small scale mine in a historically mined out South Afri-can Gold Field

Abstract: The opportunity to re-open old abandoned gold mines in South Africa, many of which are forgotten and vandalized, presents the investor, government and community a viable way to estalish a legal small scale mining industry. Under the right circumstances many of these abandoned mines offer a potential return on investment. The value add is not only for the investor and state, but also benefits the surrounding communities that were established around these mines years ago and could uplift the community’s current socio economic status. Many of these gold mines have substantial mineral resources that could support small scale mining for the next 10 years and play a material role in the inland revenue of South Africa and the rejuvenation of the local economies. The issue of abandoned gold mines is important to the South African nation because it represents many former mining sites that continue to pose a real threat to human health and safety, environmental damage and regional poverty and in many cases, abandoned mines are considered a negative legacy to the mining industry. The presence of old abandoned gold mines negatively influence the public perception of the mining industry. Generally, abandoned mines are sites where exploration, mining or mine production ceased often without rehabilitation having been implemented or incomplete. The re-opening of abandoned mines offers an opportunity to provide employment for now defunct historical mining communities. If properly done, small scale mining can offer employment to persons currently conducting illegal mining – an extremely dangerous activity that most people undertake due to a lack of other safer and legal opportunities. This paper documents the methodology that is required to gain legal access to an abandoned mine (shaft) for the purposes of exploration, technical economic evaluation and fulfilling the necessary legal requirements to eventually bring the abandoned mine to production

Solidarities at a distance: extending Fairtrade gold to East Africa

This article examines how Fairtrade is transforming artisanal and small-scale gold mining. Focusing on the “Extending Fairtrade Gold to Africa” project in East Africa, it demonstrates how Fairtrade is becoming embedded within local formalization contexts and organizational dynamics. The Project is at an early stage; therefore, findings consider emerging issues. By probing what solidarities at a distance imply for gold mining, the article elaborates on how artisanal and small-scale miner organisations are developing to produce gold for Fairtrade markets. Whilst recognising that Fairtrade is not targeting the most marginalised, unlicensed miners, those groups incorporated into Fairtrade are heterogeneous and have significant development needs. With the ‘unfinished business’ of certification and supply of Fairtrade gold to international markets only starting to be realised, time is needed to tell whether an equitable distribution of benefits from Fairtrade will be realised amongst miners and within mining communities