Zimbabwe’s artisanal miners depend on forests to survive

Hordes of artisanal gold miners throng parts of Mazowe village in Zimbabwe’s Mashonaland Central Province, where they have cut down thousands of trees to process gold ore. They are some of the miners who mine without a permit, says a report in IPS.
According to the report, these illegal gold miners claim that they could not afford coal which could have been an alternative for them. ‘We depend on the trees we cut because we can’t afford coal while we also don’t have access to electricity, is their claim which seems valid. In Zimbabwe, a tonne of coal costs $30 US dollars before transport costs are factored in, which they cannot afford.
In areas like Mazowe, forests have already fallen, thanks to these gold miners, and now the areas look like a mini desert, says the report.
According to the Forestry Commission here, this country loses 262,000 hectares of trees every year for different reasons. While Forestry officials from the Zimbabwean government lament the constant loss of forests every year. Thirty per cent of the forest is lost to illegal mining, says environmental activist, Monalisa Mafambirei, based in the Zimbabwean capital Harare.
“You speak of Mazowe as a case study, but, of course, this is not the only area losing trees to illegal gold miners. This problem facing our forests is widespread as gold miners are all over the country where gold is mined, and trees have continued to be the casualties as gold miners cut them down rather carelessly either for use when processing the gold ore or as they clear the land upon which they mine,” a government climate change officer here who said she was not authorized to give media interviews, reportedly told IPS. Even environmental campaigners have blamed the artisanal gold miners for fanning deforestation in the country.
While the blame game goes on, it may be years before a solution is found to stem the deforestation fanned by illegal gold miners in Zimbabwe. For the artisanal gold miners, however, the answer lies in formal employment. Without that, they say, forests may have to continue to suffer.

Aruna Gaitonde, Editor in Chief of the Asian Bureau, Rough&Polished