The Social And Environmental Impacts Of Mining Activities On Indigenious Communities
[THE CASE OF NEWMONT GOLD (Gh) LIMITED]

1.2. Research Objective and Research Questions

1.2.1. Research Objectives

The main objective of this study is to examine the environmental and social impacts of mining activities on indigenous community of Kenyasi. The focus is specifically on how the operation of Newmont Gold Mining Company is impacting on the Kenyasi community socially and environmentally. A second aim is to ascertain whether the company is aware of the impacts of their mining activities on the community of Kenyasi and how they are managing or intends to manage them to curtail the numerous agitations by the communities in their areas of operation.

1.2.2. Research Questions

To be able to fully understand and appreciate the extent of social and environmental impacts of mining activities on the community, I developed the following research questions;

- What was the state of natural resources in the area before the mining project?

Here, it is important that I assess the state of natural or environmental resources such as water bodies; land and forest cover prior to mining operation in the communities of operation particularly on the people of Kenyasi. This is particularly useful as it would help me make a comparative assessment of the natural and environmental resources of the community before and after the start of mining and to establish the extent of impact in terms of changes that have occurred on these environmental resources in the community since the start of mining.

- How has the social and natural environment been affected by the onset of mining operations? It is important to state that most mining communities in Ghana are rural where social life and livelihoods are primarily organized around environmental resources. Hence, the need to explore the extent to which the environment where they derive their livelihood has been affected. Has the Kenyasi community undergone any social and structural changes since mining began? Were they compensated? How the compensation package determined was and what form did the compensation package take? This, I believe would make clear the extent to which the value of the compensation offsets, equals or exceeds the cost that the community would suffer because of the mining operations in the community.

- What coping mechanisms have been developed alternatively as a result of the social and environmental impacts of mining activities? Since it is common for people to adjust to environmental and social changes and to develop some form of coping mechanisms. This

question would seek to find out from the community the specific coping mechanisms that have been developed to adjust to the environmental and social impacts of mining in their areas. Here, the various survival and coping alternatives generated by themselves or received from elsewhere, being the government, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) or the mining company itself to either prevent further impacts or adjust to the impacts would be explored and finally;

- Is Management of the Mining Company (Newmont Gold (Gh) Limited) aware of the manifest and latent impacts of their operations on the community and how are they managing or intend to manage the impacts? I intend to find out if the attention of the mining company has been drawn to the real or imagined impacts of their activities on the community in their operation site. If so, what has been their response in terms of managing the impacts of the indigenous people in the community? This question is particularly worth asking in view of the fact that mining has been officially declared as „sustainable? in the World Summit on Sustainable Development (Gualnam, 2008: 1) ironically masking any potential impact that the activity could pose for the communities where mining is carried out.

These questions I believe would be able to “squeeze the juice out of the fruit” and then present the true state of the social and environmental impacts of mining activities on communities and inform policy decisions in granting mining concessions to mining companies especially on “how to carry out their activities and ensure environmental conservation and social justice” (Gualnam, 2008: 1). It would also provide more insight in terms of the benefits and costs of mining activities since the findings would reveal to a larger extent those (multi- nationals, government, businessmen or the local communities) that benefits from the operations of mining companies and those that bear the cost thereof.