Kenya Gold Rush: Miners Risk Health and Safety in Kakamega County

Artisanal Gold Mining in Kakamega

• ⛏️ A new generation of miners in Kenya's Kakamega County are taking massive risks to extract gold from abandoned British colonial mines.
• ⚠️ Miners descend over 30 meters underground with no protective gear, navigating darkness, water, rocks, pipes, and electrical cables, facing risks of electrocution and weak rock structures.
• 💡 Many new recruits were previously cooks, farmers, or bricklayers, drawn by the potential to earn significantly more than their previous jobs, with some earning up to €30 or more per day.

Processing and Environmental Concerns

• 👩‍🔬 On the surface, women like Marceline and Teresa, formerly teachers and shopkeepers, spend their days sifting soil to extract gold from pay dirt.
• 🌍 The gold rush has transformed the region, making the land more fragile and raising concerns about environmental degradation and the use of hazardous chemicals like mercury.
• 📉 Artisanal mining is an economic sector that Kenya is struggling to regulate.

Economic Drivers and Challenges

• 📈 The price of gold has skyrocketed since the COVID pandemic and the war in Ukraine, incentivizing more people to enter artisanal mining.
• 💰 Miners can extract between 5 to 20 grams of gold daily, which is then melted down and sold abroad, making its origin and mining conditions difficult to trace.
• 📊 An estimated 30 tons of gold remain in the region's subsoil, with over 5,000 people having taken up artisanal mining in recent years.
• ⚖️ The county's mining union representative aims to register workers and ensure safety, but the number of miners has tripled, presenting significant challenges.