TOMRIC News Agency (Dar es Salaam)
Tomric Reporter
1 May 2002
Dar Es Salaam — Mercury as a health hazard to small-scale gold mining is threatening millions of people worldwide, the UN agency for Industrial Development has said.
One quarter of the world gold output is produced by artisanal miners in Africa, Asia and Latin America, who, in the process, use mercury intensively. In South Africa, for example, more than 5,000 tons of mercury has been used for gold extraction. Most of it dumped into the Amazon basin, reports have indicated.
It is reported further that millions of people die worldwide due to unclean gold mining and the use of mercury in particular.
Technically, mercury can enter the nervous system, causing loss of muscle control, brain damage and death. In pregnant women, mercury causes birth defects.
Mercury is absorbed by drinking water, eating food or breathing airs that have been contaminated.
The transformation of small-scale gold mining into a clean and sustainable Activity requires wider participation of stakeholders including key institutions, the UN agency for Industrial Development (UNIDO), has urged.
The need for the transformation of mining systems follows the fact that small-scale gold mining employs more people in developing countries than large-scale mining. In Tanzania, the sector has created direct employment for over one million people, said Mr. Felix Ugbor, UNIDO's Representative in Tanzania and Malawi.
In an interview with this agency on a donor-funded programme, Cleaner Artisanal Gold Mining and Extraction Technologies, Mr. Ugbor said having realized the importance of small-scale gold mining in a number of countries, UNIDO in collaboration with other stakeholders, has decided to assist the sector towards cleaner and more sustainable development.
He was explaining the programme's performance and the new focus as the project enters its second phase.
Given funds by the Global Environment Facility (GEF), the programme's major concern is to create awareness on new mining technology and to put emphasis on measures to avoid bad miming methods including the fight against the use of mercury in the process.
The Japanese government had also provided UNIDO with the necessary financial resources that enabled them to achieve some success during the first phase.
Being implemented in six countries, the project also aims at removing mercury pollution from artisanal gold mining.
Apart from Tanzania, other countries benefiting from the project are Sudan, Zimbabwe, Brazil, Laos, and Indonesia. GEF has allocated USD 6.8 million for the second phase of the project out of which, USD 1.6 million is meant for Tanzania.
As to why these six countries have been chosen for the project, Mr. Ugbor said it was due to the fact that they were among the nations with many artisanal miners and where mining activities take place near major water bodies.
These include artisanal gold mining near the Amazon Basin in Brazil, Lake Victoria in Tanzania, the Nile in the Sudan, the river Zambezi in Zimbabwe, and riverbed gold mining activities along the Mekong in Laos.
Mr. Ugbor could not disclose the degree of mercury's effects on the environment and the health of miners in Tanzania, but his references given indicated that in Ghana 50 percent of miners and 25 percent of non-miners are considered as suffering from mercury's toxic effects. The references are based on results of a mercury contamination study.
"In fact, the greatest danger involved in small-scale gold mining, despite its attractive potential, relates to the use of mercury in panning the ore," he said. According to him, mercury amalgamation is used because of its ability to extract gold too fine to be recovered by hand panning.
When the amalgam is heated, the mercury is burned off and pure gold remains, he said, noting, "for each gram of gold extracted, two to five grams of mercury are released into the environment."
"Our great concern is the fact that many of the small scale miners are women and in many cases, children are also involved. This fact provides the reasons for UNIDO's involvement in the attempt to reduce the dangers and risks," he elaborated.
He said during the project's first phase, UNIDO has been creating awareness and the training of small miners on the danger of using mercury. "The first phase was successful, I can say, but more efforts are still needed for the people to change their attitude and adapt a new and safe technology," he elaborated.
Under the second phase, he said, more efforts would be placed on feasible technology and UNIDO would look into ways of involving an inter-ministerial task force in the program.
As to why an inter-ministerial task force was needed at this stage, he said it was after having realized that education and awareness campaigns by themselves were not enough.
"We have realized that for the program to be a success, other issues like environment regulations, penalties and incentives, licensing and taxation systems, labour and child labour issues, are also required apart from dealing with health issues," he explained.
He said based on such a situation, they had noted a need for inter-ministerial involvement in the project.
He said in order to measure the degree of the problem; under the second phase his organization would give more support to the University of Dar Es Salaam to undertake deep research on artisanal gold mining so that they could come up with a clear situation analysis.
On the proposed actions to transform small-scale gold mining into a clean and sustainable activity, he said required measures could include increasing knowledge and awareness, assessment of the extent of mercury pollution, the establishment of a technology databank, and the introduction of demonstrations of efficient and affordable technology.
Another requirement is to put in place policies that would lead to enforceable standards as well as dissemination of relevant information, he concluded.
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