Despite the potential of artisanal mining in improving rural livelihoods, a question surrounds the extent to which it has affected livelihoods and the resultant externalities. A recent study by the African Center for Economic Transformation indicates that artisanal mining activities have destroyed farmlands and that this has extensively affected food security in and around mining communities, due to low yields and conversion of farmlands into mine sites. Artisanal mining activities have also contributed significantly to the contamination of soil and water bodies through the release of mercury and other heavy metals, soil erosion, loss of biodiversity, land degradation, deforestation and diverted waterways. These have several implications for the ecosystem as well as the environment on which humans, plants and animals living in and around mining towns depend. Currently, artisanal mining activities have been identified as the major source of water pollution in mining communities, with areas like Ghana’s Western Region experiencing acute water shortages as a result.

Such externalities – the consequences of an economic activity experienced by unrelated third parties – seem a classic case of what Garrett Hardin (1968) termed the ‘tragedy of the commons’. Hardin depicted a group of herdsmen who inevitably destroy a common shared resource due to each herdsman’s self-interest in maximizing his gains, while the cost is shared by society. Thus in the artisanal mining sector, the ‘tragedy of the commons’ is observed when artisanal miners make individual extraction decisions without considering the impact and long-term costs of those extraction decisions to themselves and others. Artisanal miners are perceived as selfish, norm-free and intent on maximizing their short-run benefits while imperiling the public good. The cost of artisanal mining activities, seen in terms of its negative impacts, are shared by all – communities and the nation alike. In addition, such tragedies are more likely to occur if the resource can be overused and accessed unrestrainedly, as is the case in Ghana.

Is the tragedy inevitable?

Tragedies of the commons are real, but not inevitable. In Hardin’s example, he proposed government intervention or privatization to avert the ‘tragedy’ but failed to recognize the potential for resource users to design and implement their own rules. Researchers like Elinor Ostrom have indicated that both government ownership and privatization of common resources are themselves subject to failure, with the latter associated with more degradation and inefficiency. Sole government regulation without involving resource users may also be subject to failure, especially in the area of artisanal mining.

Maame Esi Eshun is a Research Analyst at ACET. The views expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of ACET. 

Story republished by Ghana News