Gold rush in western Kenya: Miners risk health and safety in Kakamega county

FRANCE 24 English

Miners in Kenya risk their lives every day to extract gold 30 meters below the Earth's surface. With the recent gold rush in the country, artisanal mining is raising concerns over negative environmental consequences and poor labor conditions. Our colleagues at France Télévisions Lucile Chaussoy, Fabien Fougère, and Joseph Bohbot and France 24's Florent Marchais have this report.  Visit our website: http://www.france24.com  Like us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FRANCE24.English  Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/France24_en

Transcript

00:00A small nugget of gold.

00:03In the west of Kenya, a new generation of miners

00:06is willing to take massive risks to find them.

00:10Each morning, men from Kakamega County

00:12set out to work in artisanal mines.

00:19Before descending, the leader of this group of miners

00:22gives safety instructions.

00:24He's worried for the new recruits.

00:30Is it OK?

00:32Light it.

00:34Let's go.

00:37They work in an old British gold mine

00:40that was abandoned after Kenya's independence.

00:43Now, a Kenyan owner has taken over operations at the site.

00:47It reaches more than 30 meters underground.

00:55You have to watch where you step.

00:56There are rocks, pipes, and electrical cables.

01:02The miners plunge into the darkness,

01:04armed only with their headlamps.

01:06They have no protective gear.

01:08They continue to walk in more than a meter of water,

01:11trying to avoid electrocution.

01:13The material we want, which we get gold from them.

01:18It is this line.

01:19I don't know if you can see the line.

01:22The working is very dangerous.

01:23Like, after blasting, you get the areas where the rock is very weak.

01:31The men dig all day without seeing a single nugget.

01:38For hours, they take shifts in the dark to fill bags with quartz,

01:43hoping to spot some gold.

01:45They have very little oxygen.

01:50Despite the risks, they don't hesitate to work in the mine.

02:04Only a few months ago, they were cooks, farmers, or bricklayers, like Dennis.

02:08When I was a bricklayer, I earned three euros a day.

02:13Here in the mine, I can earn 30 euros, or even more.

02:18A gold rush has transformed the landscape of the region.

02:22Artisanal mining is making the land more fragile.

02:25On the surface, women take up the next set of tasks.

02:30Marceline was a teacher.

02:32And Theresa, a shopkeeper.

02:36Now, they spend all day sieving out impurities from pay dirt.

02:40I am processing this soil that I have brought from the mining.

02:45The cold will remain on these rocks.

02:48Because that cold is strong.

02:50If the soil is light, it moves with water.

02:53I will remove these rocks and get that cold.

02:58Timothy Mukoshi, the county's mining union representative,

03:02visits the site.

03:03He's supposed to officially register the workers and ensure their safety.

03:10The number of people has tripled in the mining fields.

03:13There are quite a lot of issues linked to the miners.

03:16For example, the issue of environmental degradation,

03:21the issue of hazardous chemicals, e.g. mercury,

03:25and also the key issue is the lack of mining technology.

03:32Most workers are not officially registered.

03:35They sell their gold to wholesalers in the city who prefer to remain anonymous.

03:40Since the COVID pandemic and the war in Ukraine,

03:43the price of gold has skyrocketed.

03:47We do this every day.

03:49It can be 5, 10, or 20 grams.

03:51We heat it for 20 minutes, then remove it and pour it here.

03:55The gold is then sold abroad.

03:58Once melted down, it is difficult to trace its origin

04:01and determine the conditions under which it was mined.

04:0530 tons of gold reportedly remain in the region's subsoil,

04:09and more than 5,000 people have taken up artisanal mining here in recent years.

04:13It's an economic sector Kenya still struggles to regulate

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