Publication: Supporting Artisanal and Small-scale Mining Communities During the COVID-19 Pandemic
Loading...
Date
2023-08-01
ISSN
Published
2023-08-01
Author(s)
Editor(s)
Abstract
In 2020, the World Bank projected that the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic could push more than hundred million people into extreme poverty. The estimated forty-five million people around the world working in artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) were particularly vulnerable because of the informal, often precarious nature of their working conditions and lack of access to social safety nets. At the height of the initial lockdown, as mineral prices dropped and mining sites closed, artisanal and small-scale miners, their families, and their communities suffered large declines in income and rising food insecurity. Without intervention, they were at risk of sliding into poverty. At the same time, there was concern that gains made over several decades to formalize the sector would be eroded, particularly where community tensions were rising. To address these risks, the World Bank took early action. In May 2020, the extractives global programmatic support (EGPS) trust fund initiated a rapid global survey to identify miners’ needs and then used the results to mobilize an emergency response window that raised 6.6 million in support to ASM communities in 22 countries. This report describes the EGPS emergency response window for ASM Communities Impacted by COVID-19, what it achieved, and what the World Bank has identified as priority areas for action in ASM communities going forward.
Link to Data Set
Citation
“World Bank. 2023. Supporting Artisanal and Small-scale Mining Communities During the COVID-19 Pandemic. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/40125 License: CC BY-NC 3.0 IGO.”
Associated URLs
Associated content
Other publications in this report series
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue
Collections
Related items
Showing items related by metadata.
Publication Gender Dimensions of Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining : A Rapid Assessment Toolkit(World Bank, 2012-01-01)Artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) is a global reality. It represents a longstanding and important livelihood for more than 100 million men and women around the world. In some places, communities have practiced it for generations; in other places, the prospect of new mineral finds draws large numbers of people suddenly to mining areas. Whether newly begun or long established, ASM has the potential to help men and women out of poverty when conducted in an informed and responsible way. In different communities, different techniques are used, and men and women share different divisions of labor, risks, and opportunities. ASM assessments, and the recommendations for action arising from these, are critical to the objectives of every ASM stakeholder, whether the large-scale mining (LSM) company seeking to improve the outcomes of its corporate social responsibility programs, a government agency or nongovernmental organization (NGO) seeking to fulfill its policy mandate, a microfinance organization promoting small and medium enterprise development in mining areas, or an association of miners seeking to formalize its activities. The toolkit is comprised of six components: introduction to gender and ASM; the gender and ASM framework; gender and ASM tools; the toolkit in practice; resources; and supplemental CD-ROM.Publication Transparency in Revenues from Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining of Tin, Tantalum, Tungsten and Gold in Burundi(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2016-01)Burundi has a wide range of mineral deposits of which tin, tantalum and tungsten ores, along with gold, are its primary mineral exports. Burundi’s geological endowment also includes nickel, rare earths, vanadium, and construction materials. The majority of mineral extraction is carried out by artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) which is officially structured through cooperatives. Tin, tantalum, tungsten (from the minerals cassiterite, tantalite and wolframite and often referred to as the ‘3Ts’) and gold are the primary minerals mined and exported. Improvements in the gold sector are where the Burundian Government stands to make the greatest gains though this is complex to achieve and needs a very practical strategy which is grounded in market and trade realities. Taxation is one element of this but should not be considered in isolation. Engagement with the existing market and finding incentives for formalization is essential. The Government of Burundi should showcase its efforts to improve transparency and traceability. The next step will be to use EITI and iTSCi standards to help to meet the basic needs of artisanal mining communities and to contribute to formalization. This will promote positive perceptions and acceptance of both systems to the benefit of Burundi’s mineral sector and national revenues.Publication Achieving Sustainable and Inclusive Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining (ASM)(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-09-16)Artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) has played an increasingly active role in national development and international trade over the decades. As of 2024, those engaged directly and indirectly in the sector’s labor value chain make up more than 225 million people working across Latin and South America, Africa, and Asia. Studies estimate that women account for between 18 percent and 50 percent of the 45 million people who work directly in ASM. Artisanal and small-scale miners work in diverse mineral supply chains - ranging from well-known minerals and metals such as gold, cobalt, copper, and semiprecious and precious gemstones to lesser-known materials such as salt, gravel, and quarry rock. Growth in the share of artisanal or small-scale mined material has grown significantly. In short, ASM is vital to global prosperity and poverty reduction, but the sector must also lead in environmental stewardship. As heard from miners and other stakeholders, safety and well-being along with environmental stewardship, increased domestic revenues, and improved productivity will be important outcomes to judge success. These are the incentives that will help development efforts be taken up more readily and widely by ASM actors and governments themselves. World Bank support to country clients will need to be more adaptive in their funding timelines, with a view to scaling from the start to achieve outcomes in the most effective and lean way possible. Importantly, World Bank interventions should be more participatory and ASM actor-centered, given time and resources to build the trust and create incentives for behavior change.Publication Developing Forest-Smart Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining (ASM) Standards(Washington, DC, 2021)Deforestation and forest degradation are the second leading cause of global warming. Forest loss disrupts ecosystem services, depletes biodiversity, and ultimately undermines the fulfillment of basic human rights. The mining sector is the fourth largest driver of deforestation after agriculture, wood production, and urban development. To tackle the threat that mining poses to forests, the World Bank conceived forest-smart mining as part of their Climate-Smart Mining Initiative, which was launched in 2019. Forest-smart mining (FSM) is mining that acknowledges and understands the relationship between forests and other land uses such as socio-economic uses and ecosystem services, and actively seeks to reduce loss or damage to those uses, and in some cases, promote a net gain for them. In 2020, the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF) made funds available to the Extractives Industries and Environment & Natural Resources Units of the World Bank to carry out the study Developing Forest-Smart Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining Standards/Guidance, and a sister study Guidance to Applying Nature-Based Solutions in the Large-Scale Mining Sector that examines the scope for mining companies to more robustly finance and support nature-based solutions. The FCPF funded these studies to get the private sector more directly involved in financing nature-based solutions. This final report provides an overview of the project's purpose, scope, methodology, and processes, and a compilation of the project's findings, recommendations, and products. The authors acknowledge with gratitude the valuable inputs from the Global Advisory Panel, contributing to the conceptualization, development, and validation of the main deliverable, the Forest-Smart Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining Standard (FS-ASM Standard and Guidelines), produced as annex I to this report. The report provides general recommendations for the adoption of the FS-ASM Standard in global and national processes. In addition, there is a suite of road maps, workplans, and budgets for ground-validating the standard in the pilot sites in Colombia, Peru, Ghana, and Liberia.Publication Mining Together : Large-Scale Mining Meets Artisanal Mining, A Guide for Action(Washington, DC, 2009-03)The present guide mining together-when large-scale mining meets artisanal mining is an important step to better understanding the conflict dynamics and underlying issues between large-scale and small-scale mining. This guide for action not only points to some of the challenges that both parties need to deal with in order to build a more constructive relationship, but most importantly it sheds more light on some potential interventions for conflict prevention, management, and even transformation. This guide, then, represents a step in the right direction to start transforming the relationship between large-scale and artisanal miners through win-win solutions that emerge out of the genuine interaction and dialogue of all stakeholders involved: governments, companies, communities, miners and development organizations. Large-Scale Mining (LSM) companies increasingly come across Artisanal and Small-scale Mining (ASM) workers during their exploration or production activities in the developing world. The ASM-LSM relationship is often conflictual because both types of miners compete for the same resource or because they perceive each other as a threat. However the ASM-LSM relationship is now also undergoing a largely positive evolution in part thanks to new Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) commitments. This guide is the result of this collaboration and provides an informative overview of the growing experiences of the most typical ASM-LSM issues and guidance for appropriate interventions.
Users also downloaded
Showing related downloaded files
Publication Private Health Sector Assessment in Ghana(World Bank, 2011-04-26)Most countries in Sub-Saharan Africa confront serious health challenges; however, Ghana has done beer than many of its neighbors. Ghana's life expectancy at birth is 60 years (versus 53 for all of Sub-Saharan Africa), the infant mortality rate is 73 per thousand (versus 79), and the maternal mortality ratio is 562 per 100,000 (versus 832) (World Bank 2009b). Ghana has worked hard to achieve the gains it has made, and it has benefited from substantial assistance from external development partners. Ghana has separated policy making the Ministry of Health, (MOH) from provision Ghana Health Service (GHS) in the public sector and decentralized health service management to the district level. In 2004, Ghana instituted its National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) to ease consumers' need to mobilize payment at the time of illness. The private health sector in Ghana is a large and important factor in the market for health-related goods and services. The size and configuration of private providers and their contribution to health sector outcomes. With beer information about the size, scope, distribution, and constraints of private actors, Ghana's public policy makers could engage more effectively with the private sector. Through dialogue and the use of regulatory mechanisms and other tools, public policy could influence the practices and development of the private role in health so that it beer serves national health goals and objectives. The research team employed a supply and demand approach to identify market, policy, and institutional failures or weaknesses that could be addressed through policy change and action. The specific analyses conducted included the following: secondary analysis of nationally representative household surveys in Ghana; mapping of the private health sector and short-form questionnaire with all formal health service providers public and private in Ghana; focus group discussions with a subset of private providers in the mapping sample; patient exit polls at a subset of facilities in the mapping sample; population focus groups with women and men in the mapped districts; and national-level key informant interviews.Publication Survey on the Implementation of the Cape Town Global Action Plan for Sustainable Development Data(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2022-01)Since its launch in January 2017 at the first UN World Data Forum in South Africa, and its formal adoption by the United Nations Statistical Commission at its forty-eighth session in March 2017, the Cape Town Global Action Plan for Sustainable Development Data (CTGAP) has provided a framework for planning and implementing the statistical capacity building activities needed to achieve the scope and intent of the 2030 agenda for sustainable development, and to mobilize funding for the modernization of national statistical systems across the world. However, when the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic hit the world in early 2020, national statistical authorities and the international statistical community inevitably shifted their attention to the immediate challenge of ensuring the continuity of the most basic statistical operations, and to addressing new, urgent data demands. As a consequence, significant resources were diverted away from longer-term initiatives aimed at achieving the shared goals crystallized in the commitment and vision of the CTGAP. This report presents the results of a survey conducted by the World Bank, the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD), and PARIS21, with the aim to inform actions by decision makers and international partners to implement, monitor, and finance the CTGAP. This last survey was launched with the purpose of seeing beyond the immediate crisis, and to ensure that the current constraints do not distract attention from the common goals enshrined in the 2030 agenda for sustainable development and the implementation of the CTGAP.Publication Making Procurement Work Better – An Evaluation of the World Bank’s Procurement System(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-12-06)This evaluation assesses the results, successes, and challenges of the World Bank 2016 procurement reform. Procurements acquire the works, goods, and services necessary to achieve the World Bank’s project development outcomes. The World Bank’s procurement processes must ensure that clients get the best value for every development dollar. In 2016, the World Bank reformed its procurement system for Investment Project Financing and launched a new procurement framework aimed at enhancing the Bank’s development effectiveness through better procurement. The reform sought to reduce procurement bottlenecks impeding project performance and modernize procurement systems. It emphasized cutting edge international good practice principles and was intended to be accompanied by procurement capacity strengthening to help client countries. This evaluation offers three recommendations to scale up reform implementation and enhance portfolio and project performance: (i) Improve change management support for the reform’s implementation. (ii) Strategically strengthen country-level procurement capacity. (iii) Consistently manage the full spectrum of procurement risks to maximize project success.Publication The Role of Coherence in Strengthening Community Accountability for Remote Schools in Indonesia(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2022-04)Incoherence in accountability relationships, or the lack of alignment between the various components of a specific education system, can hamper the quality of education. Such incoherence can be a particular challenge in resource constrained, remote villages where teachers tend to have higher educational capital and social status than the parents and communities whom they serve. We analyzed quantitative and qualitative data from a randomized controlled trial of a social accountability mechanism (SAM) for primary schools in remote Indonesian villages. The intervention had three treatment groups, all of which included the SAM, that engaged village-level stakeholders in a consensus-building process that led to joint service agreements for supporting the learning process. Prior analyses have found that all three treatment groups significantly improved student learning, but the treatment group combining the SAM with teacher performance pay based on camera-monitored teacher attendance led to much larger gains than the SAM-only treatment group or the treatment group combining the SAM with teacher performance pay based on a community-evaluated scorecard. Drawing on a range of quantitative data sources across all treatment group schools (process monitoring, survey, and service agreement indicators) and qualitative data from nine case study schools (interviews and focus group discussions), we show first that the student learning gains across all three treatment groups were accompanied by increases in both the coherence of the accountability relationships between village-level stakeholders and the degree to which these relationships were oriented toward the purpose of cultivating learning. We further show that the treatment group combining the SAM with camera monitored teacher attendance led to greater improvements in the coherence of accountability relationships than the other treatment groups, because the cameras improved both the technical capacity and the social legitimacy of community members to hold teachers accountable. This coherence-focused, relational explanation for the relative effectiveness of the treatment groups has more explanatory power than alternative explanations that focus narrowly on information quality or incentive structure. Our analysis reinforces arguments for ensuring that accountability structures are coherent with the local context, including local social structures and power dynamics.Publication WBG COVID-19 Crisis Response Operational Update(Washington, DC, 2022-03-31)This note provides an update on the WBG’s COVID-19 Crisis Response, outlined in June 2020 to help developing countries address the impacts of the pandemic while maintaining a line of sight to long-term development goals. It comprises five short sections: (I) the impacts of COVID-19 and compounding crises on developing countries, (II) an update on the WBG’s operational crisis response and priorities moving forward, (III) the critical role of international coordination, (IV) WBG financing framework for GRID, and (V) concluding remarks.