Date: 2017
Raw Materials: Non-mineral specific. Gold, gemstones and development minerals are most prevalent.
Location: Kenya
Challenge: planning the effective implementation of the Kenyan Mining Policy and Mining Act
The Kenyan Mining and Minerals Policy and the Mining Act (2016) outlined ambitious reforms for the minerals sector, including significant changes to the definition, legal status and governance of artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) in the country. It recognised artisanal mining activity for the first time, providing a basis for the government to legalise and formalise the sector, which was estimated to directly employ approximately 140,000 people.
Despite the government’s ambitions, significant obstacles stood in the way of them achieving their vision for the sector. These included the high levels of informality, difficulties in attracting finance and limited business skills of artisanal miners, along with poor health and safety standards, a shortage of access to geo-data, and inefficient and environmentally damaging exploration, extraction and processing techniques.
Addressing these challenges as part of a comprehensive strategy was therefore essential, to ensure that the sector’s value could be efficiently harnessed for broad-based, equitable development.
In this context, Levin Sources was hired by the DFID-funded Kenya Extractives Programme (KEXPRO) to facilitate the Kenyan government (GoKenya) to develop a national artisanal mining strategy.
Solution: development of the Kenyan Artisanal Mining Strategy (KAMS)
The development of the KAMS was a government-led process, facilitated and guided by Levin Sources.
We were responsible for consulting with key stakeholders to inform government priorities, hosting two workshops for the national-level mining administration to define programming around these priorities. In collaboration with the Ministry of Mines (MoM), we then drafted the outputs of the workshops into a coherent and actionable strategy, outlining GoKenya’s vision and objectives and the concrete interventions required to fulfil them.
Results: a national strategy to formalise ASM
The project developed a national artisanal mining strategy, which has subsequently been used by the Kenyan mining administration to guide their ambitions to formalise the AM sector, something which is encapsulated in their vision statement:
Artisanal Mining Vision Statement: The Government of Kenya undertakes to realise a formal, safe, clean, productive and adequately supported artisanal mining sector that promotes the inclusive local and national economic development. |
The KAMS has been primarily used as an internal government reference document for the planning and management of the sector since it was completed in November 2017.
