This report investigates the threats to the livelihoods of Indian Lanjigarh locals after the arrival of a subsidiary of Vedanta. It presents the myths about Vedanta in relation to this project and unravels the truth behind each with evidence from official reports, journalists, Action Aid’s own field visits and first hand accounts of local people. The locals of Niyamgiri mountain, in Kalahandi District, Orissa, India have lived for decades by foraging in the forests, raising chickens and growing vegetables and rice.

This study focuses on mining related conflicts in Tanzania, a relatively new mining country. It argues that unclear land and mining rights, and conceptual differences in how land and mining rights are perceived, contribute to conflict in the country and to a feeling among both local people and human rights advocacy groups that the government has betrayed ordinary people.The study finds that there have been seven recorded conflicts related to mining companies in the country, six of them taking place over the last seven years.

This paper argues that mining can not be considered ‘sustainable’ if indigenous cultures are rendered unsustainable in the process. Given that many remaining unexploited ores lie under indigenous lands, there is increasing pressure to mine on or near indigenous lands.

A wave of commercial investments in the natural resource sectors has rekindled debates about the place of contracts in the interface between economic governance and control over natural resources.

This thesis documents as well as questions how the presence of large mining operations in Andean regions of Peru alters social and natural landscapes. Taking conflicts over water as a useful entry-point for the analysis, it explores and unravels the dilemmas and challenges faced by the main conflicting actors: rural communities and mining companies. Through an in-depth analysis of how the actors navigate these challenges, focusing on those related to water, the thesis sets out to understand what happens with water in contexts of mineral extraction.

This article analyzes different visions and positions in a conflict between the developer of an open-pit mine in Mexico and project opponents using the echelons of rights analysis framework, distinguishing four layers of dispute: contested resources; contents of rules and regulations; decision-making power; and discourses. Complexities in this study manifest how communities’ land and water rights are circumvented by governmental bodies and ambivalent regulations favouring the large mining company. This process is importantly reinforced by international trade legislation.

El Proceso Campesino y Popular del Municipio La Vega, Cauca (PCPV) es una experiencia popularcampesina y comunitaria de autonomía y resistencia enmarcada dentro del municipio de LaVega, localizado al sur del departamento del Cauca, a 3 horas aproximadamente de Popayán,capital departamental. Entre montañas, valles, ríos, páramos y lagunas, La Vega se encuentraenmarcada en la región biográfica d

Discordia y ambigüedad, son las dos palabras que describen la relación entre la minería a gran escala y el desarrollo. “Discordia” porque para la mayoría la minería frecuentemente ha producido efectos sociales, medio ambientales y económicos adversos y, para muy pocos ganancias significativas. Ambigüedad porque entre las poblaciones locales, así como a nivel de los profesionales del desarrollo, existe el sentimiento de que la minería podría contribuir mucho más. Los conflictos sociales y medioambientales producidos por el impacto de la minería surgen dentro de esa ambigüedad y conflicto.

This paper analyses patterns of corruption and corruption risks related to community mineral beneficiation schemes (CMBSs) that distribute benefits funded by mineral revenues to communities. It analyses insights from existing scholarship on CMBSs, evidence from seven cases of corruption, and lessons from guidance documents on reducing corruption in the mining value chain. The aim of the paper is to stimulate debate and further research about the suitability of anti-corruption strategies for CMBSs.

Our new feature film from Roy Maconachie and Simon Wharf explores the pathway of a diamond from mine to market, and asks the question, who really benefits?

The current approach to peacebuilding by the international community is to focus on the priorities thought to be important to recovery, but this occurs in a largely non-integrated way. With these different endeavors largely isolated from each other in planning, analysis, implementation, and measures for success, little is known about how they interact and whether or not the aggregate effect contributes to, or detracts from durable peace. This is especially important for priorities which in some way interact with each other on the ground among a recipient population.

Multinational companies are increasingly promoted as peacebuilders. Major arguments in support of such a position emphasise both interest-based and norm/socialisation-based factors. This article uses research on large mining MNCs in eastern DRC – those that, arguably, should be most likely to build peace according to the above positions – to engage critically with the business for peace agenda. First it demonstrates the limited peacemaking, as well as active peacebuilding, activities in broader society that companies undertake.