Artisanal operations are characterized by their low productivity, scarce safety conditions and negative impact on the environment. In Peru, mining has proliferated due to a combination of survival and opportunity. It has turned out to be one of the few subsistence activities in depressed areas, where agriculture or grazing are not possible or have disappeared. While artisanal mining dates pre-Columbian time, it has extended since 1980s as a consequence of economic recession, agricultural crisis, and political violence.
La Rinconada is the highest permanently inhabited town in the world at present time, located in Puno, in southern Peru, at 5100 meters above sea level. Geography is rough and not apt for agriculture. Altitude and weather conditions are extremely adverse; temperatures can drop until -26°C. La Rinconada is no-man’s-land: it’s characterized by the little or no presence of the state. Law has been replaced by informal rules, codes and beliefs.
The unprecedented international prices of gold have lead to a gold rush in the country, but also in La Rinconada. The population passed from 10,140 in 2002 to approximately 30,000 in 2011. Housing conditions are deplorable. Most of La Rinconada’s 5,000 families live in houses made of rock and mud or corrugated metal, which are inadequate for low temperatures. Conditions are overcrowded as families live in single-rooms dwellings smaller than 10 square meters.
Today, more than 80% of the population is dedicated to mining activities. Actually, the whole town is obsessed with gold and has attracted thousands of dreamers anxious to strike it rich, even if it means destroying their environment in the process. Given the generalized extreme poverty, income relies on the participation of women and children. Whole families are thus involved in the processing of gold, an extremely risky livelihood in terms of health and safety, especially for children.
The legal owner of the mineral rights to the gold deposit is Corporación Minera Ananea S.A., which only exploits a portion of it for its own production. The remaining sections are outsourced to 250 contractors through exploitation agreements. Each contractor is an independent corporation that takes care of a part of the deposit, investing in the construction of shafts, machinery, feedstock, and engaging personnel. The number of workers varies according to season, prices of gold, and fluctuations of veins. They are retained through an oral agreement called cachorreo, by which they work for 28 days and, in exchange, they get the right to mine for 1 or 2 days and keep the ore for themselves. This is what passes for a pay check: a sack of rocks that may contain a small fortune or, more often, very little at all.
But the contractor is in a position to determine who and when can access the shafts as part of cachorreo, allowing him to favour his own relatives and friends or sparing the best areas. The oral nature of the agreement enables the contractors to hold no liability to the worker, who has no health insurance, protection against accidents, or retirement program. Cachorreo relies on the skills and physical effort of each worker. This means that the income that a miner can get varies every month. In average, workers produce 10 grams of gold per month, equivalent to US$ 170. In a bad month, though, he could simply receive nothing. Considering the variable income, women and children must work to support the household.
Ore from the bedrock operations is processed using intensive labour force, low capital, and poor technology. Mercury amalgamation, a simple and relative low cost process, is used in La Rinconada, though it is illegal in most countries. Miners, women and children are exposed to mercury in the processing gold and drinking of polluted waters.
I plan to explore the following points from a political ecology perspective:
1. 1. Why is La Rinconada in a legal limbo? Labour relations, together with environmental, health and safety regulations in the mine are left to informal arrangements among the company, contractors and workers.
2. 2. Show the unequal relationships of power and gender in the mine:
a. Workers have no access to formalization or technology
b. Workers have no access to information and training in the handling of mercury
c. Workers have no access to information on the international price of gold, in real time, so they are often deceived by the gold buyers
3. 3. The imageries of luck and superstition: What makes people stand such adverse labour and living conditions? Is it just the idea that they will make a big hit someday and become rich? Is this comparable to gold rush in the American West?
4. 4. Is the cachorreo lottery system inhuman? What are the origins of this system (maybe rooted in pre-colonial or colonial arrangements)? Why do workers favour this system despite the injustices it brings about?
5. 5. Environmental change: artisanal mining has transformed the environment in La Rinconada: mercury has polluted rivers and lakes, which are the main source of water for the locals. Even worse, mercury has been found in the blood of family members, which has serious repercussions in their health.
GAMARRA CHILMAZA, F. 2005. Estudio Sociolaboral en los Cerros Poblados de La Rinconada y Cerro Lunar Puno [Online]. Lima: IPEC-OIT. Available: http://redsocial.pe/II-SOCIOLABORAL.pdf [Accessed 11/11/2011.
GLAVE, M. A. A. K., JUANA Minería, Minerales y Desarrollo Sustentable en Peru. GRADE.
KURAMOTO, J. R. 2001. Artisanal and Informal Mining in Peru. Mining, Minerals and Sustainable Development [Online]. Available: http://www.ibcperu.org/doc/isis/6020.pdf [Accessed 11/11/2011]
LARMER, B. 2009. The Real Price of Gold. National Geographic [Online]. Available: http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2009/01/gold/larmer-text [Accessed 11/11/2011].
WEST, J. B. 2002. Highest Permanent Human Habitation. High Altitude Medicine & Biology, 3, 401-407.
Patrick. This looks like an interesting paper and I hope you have found adequate source material. Remember to set up some sort of theoretical framework using a political ecology perspective - as simple as saying you will look at political economy/power, the agency of the miners (if any) and the natural environment. See if you can argue that the paper is an original contribution if you find noone else has analysed the situation as you have.
ReplyDeleteDiana
PS I mentioned you to Carl Bauer and suggested he recruit you to do a PhD!