Diagnosis of environmental problems related to vein gold mining in Colombia

Future direction of Au agromining on how to solve artisanal and small scale gold mining problems

Journal of Degraded and Mining Lands Management ◽

10.15243/jdmlm.2021.084.2971 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 8 (4) ◽

pp. 2971-2984

Author(s):

Abd Mujahid Hamdan ◽

Rizna Rahmi ◽

Abd Hafidz ◽

R Risplaman

Keyword(s):

Gold Mining ◽

Environmental Problems ◽

Small Scale ◽

Mining Method ◽

Green Innovation ◽

Economic Problems ◽

The Social ◽

Future Direction

Indonesia is one of the countries with the largest Au deposited. Gold mining has been the backbone of Indonesia’s economy. However, Indonesia also faces huge problems of Artisanal and Small Scale Gold Mining (ASGM) in a number of areas of Indonesia. A number of problems follow this Au mining method, including environmental, social and economic problems. Green innovation and technologies are needed to solve the problems. To date, Au agromining has been considered as a technology that can solve the numerical problems of Au conventional mining in the sector mentioned before. Gold agromining also has been proposed as a solution for the ASGM problem in Indonesia. However, until now, there have been no reports on the use of Au agromining technology in Indonesia. In fact, agromining research has been very advanced and is considered very prospective. This paper outlines the potentials of Au agromining to be implemented in Indonesia to overcome the social and environmental problems of ASGM.

Download Full-text

Artisanal and small-scale mining activities as post-mining land use in abandoned mine sites: a case of Giyani and Musina areas, Limpopo Province of South Africa

Journal of Degraded and Mining Lands Management ◽

10.15243/jdmlm.2021.083.2815 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 8 (3) ◽

pp. 2815-2827

Author(s):

Sphiwe Emmanuel Mhlongo ◽

George Oluwole Akintola

Keyword(s):

South Africa ◽

Gold Mining ◽

Health And Safety ◽

Environmental Problems ◽

Abandoned Mine ◽

Small Scale ◽

Safety Risks ◽

Abandoned Mine Sites ◽

Health And Safety Risks ◽

Mine Sites

South Africa has many artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) activities that some are registered and others informal and illegal. This paper presents an overview of ASM operations in the vicinity of abandoned mine sites found in Giyani and Musina areas, Limpopo Provine of South Africa. It looks at the mining processes, environmental problems, and health and safety risks of ASM in the area. It also provideds a discussion of practical ways of dealing with the problems of artisanal and small-scale mining operations in a harmonized way with the rehabilitation of the abandoned mine sites. The exploitation of waste rock dumps for aggregate production in Musina demonstrated that formalized ASM activities can be the best alternative uses of the abandoned mine sites. However, artisanal gold mining around Giyani revealed the health and safety risks and environmental problems of these operations. The artisanal gold mining activities worsened the health and safety and the environmental problems of the abandoned mine sites. Therefore, this paper recommends that the efforts of coming up with strategies to formalize and regulate artisanal mining in South Africa be deepened for these activities to be accepteble as sustainable as post-mining land-uses in abandoned mines.

Download Full-text

Detection of Artisanal and Small-Scale Gold Mining Activities and Their Transformation Using Earth Observation, Nighttime Light, and Precipitation Data

International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health ◽

10.3390/ijerph182010954 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 18 (20) ◽

pp. 10954

Author(s):

Satomi Kimijima ◽

Masayuki Sakakibara ◽

Masahiko Nagai

Keyword(s):

Gold Mining ◽

Environmental Governance ◽

Rapid Change ◽

Environmental Problems ◽

Google Earth ◽

Small Scale ◽

Mining Activities ◽

Precipitation Data ◽

Remotely Sensed Data ◽

Nighttime Light

The rapid growth of artificially constructed mining camps has negatively impacted the camps’ surrounding environment and the informal communities that have developed inside the camps. However, artisanal and small-scale gold mining (ASGM) is generally informal, illegal, and unregulated; thus, transformations of the mining activities and potential social-environmental problems resulting from these changes are not revealed. This study assesses the transformation of mining activities in camp-type ASGM sectors in Gorontalo, Indonesia, during 2014–2020 using remotely sensed data, such as Landsat series, nighttime light, and precipitation data obtained through Google Earth Engine. Results show that the combined growth of the built-up areas increased 4.8-fold, and their annual mean nighttime light increased 3.8-fold during 2014–2019. Furthermore, diverse increases in the sizes of area and nighttime light intensity were identified from the mining camps. Among the studied camps, since 2017, Motomboto camp 3 showed a particularly rapid change in activity regardless of the season of the year. Hence, these approaches are capable of identifying rapid transformations in the mining activities and provide significant insight into the socio-environmental problems originating from the closed and vulnerable camp-based ASGM sector. Our results also contribute to developing rapid and appropriate interventions and strengthening environmental governance.

Download Full-text