On the 18-24 May 2015, Policy Forum – Local Government Working Group (LGWG) was invited to participate in the “World Village Festival” and other subsequent events organized by Kepa in Helsinki, Finland. The event brought in different NGOs from Europe, the Middle East and Africa to discuss the opportunities and challenges related to development that developing countries are facing but more specifically how decisions made in the north affect the lives of people in poorer countries.   

Participating in the discussion entitled “Artisanal Miners: what are the challenges at local level” Alex Modest Ruchyahinduru, Manager of Communication and Advocacy pointed out that Tanzania just like any country in Africa with mineral resources, artisanal miners do face several challenges including evacuation of their mining places adding that this has been due to lack of license security compared to big investors with big mining license who are given first priority.

He said, due to small capital and lack of collateral, artisanal miners in Tanzaniaare unable to secure loans from banks and other financial institutions for their starting capital and more worse for female miners and for miners who operate without licenses. This also affected them in accessing marketing information in related to their products e.g the prices of Gold they sell it for, in comparison to the real value. Apart from obtaining finances, he added that artisanal miners also face some other challenges like transport, tax regime, job security and child labour.

He also said that lack of skills of artisanal miners on the mining sectors has also been a challenge. Most miners lack the technical know-how to improve their capacity and productivity and hence earn very little raw materials. “Most activities to support mining sectors have leaned on the large scale mining operations”

He added that the inclusion of artisanal miners in Government Policy and development planning and from social and environment policies such as health care and natural resource management is fundamental and hence the government and CSOs need to work together to bring change and attitudes on the ground.