Levin Sources has launched a research effort into the impacts of the COVID-19 crisis on artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) communities in four countries (Mozambique, Uganda, Zimbabwe and the DRC) as part of a global data collection exercise on the impacts of COVID-19 in ASM communities unded by the World Bank’s Extractives Global Programmatic Support Multi-Donor Trust Fund and coordinated through the Delve COVID-19 Impact Reporting initiative which covers 23 different countries.
Our work in Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Uganda is co-funded by the World Bank and Gemcorp, whilst the DRC research is supported by the USAID-funded Commercially Viable Conflict-Free Gold (CVCFG) project. Over the next 10 weeks we will make the raw data publicly available and share insights through the Levin Sources COVID-19 insights page and the DELVE database.
We are proud to be involved in a global initiative that is at the forefront of taking concrete action to ensure support for the ASM sector worldwide. This research plays a critical role by:
- Building the case for public, private and civil society engagement with the ASM sector both as part of emergency response and longer-term sectoral recovery programming, including support for the progressive formalisation of the sector. This aligns with the ‘call to action’ proclamations of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) (English, French) and over 70 civil society organisations (CSOs) working on ASM and responsible sourcing worldwide.
- Contributing to the body of evidence revealing the effect of the pandemic on ASM communities and associated value chains, with a view to informing programmatic design. This corresponds with the case we put forward in our blog on ASM programming in the COVID-19 era that evidenced-based decision making is essential to ensure emergency response efforts are targeted, relevant and effective, and so maximise their impacts.
What can you expect from the initiative and how can you engage?
- Levin Sources will produce 5 data sets per country over ten weeks on the topics of health, gender, human security, food security, service delivery and government engagement, and markets and supply chains.
- We will generate periodic reports demonstrating what this means for ASM communities and supply chains.
- We will explore differential impacts of the crisis through short comparative assessments of the international data.
Levin Sources is committed to sharing the data we collect through this exercise with all relevant interested stakeholders. You will be able to download the data we generate and read our reports, which will be published periodically. Please get in touch with our experts should you have any questions about our findings or wish to explore in further detail what they mean for you.
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Watch this space!
