Gendered livelihoods and land tenure: The case of artisanal gold miners in Mali, West Africa

Geoforum 105 (2019) 54–62

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Geoforum journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/geoforum

Gendered livelihoods and land tenure: The case of artisanal gold miners in Mali, West Africa

T

Leif V. Brottema, , Lassine Bab ⁎

a b

Grinnell College, Global Development Studies Program, 1115 8th Avenue, Grinnell, IA 50112, United States Institute for the Support of Rural Municipalities (BACR), Kassaro, Mali

ARTICLE INFO

ABSTRACT

Keywords: Artisanal mining Land tenure Gender Political ecology Livelihoods West Africa

Artisanal small-scale mining (ASM) is an important source of income for millions of sub-Saharan Africans. Scholars from various disciplines have demonstrated that urban and rural Africans take up mining as a response to unemployment, lack of credit and poor income prospects in the agricultural sector, and as a way for young people to achieve a degree of personal autonomy. Although several studies have investigated the role of women in artisanal mining, little attention has been given to the gendered land tenure rights that govern mineral resource access and that shape the prospects for mining as a viable livelihood strategy. This article presents evidence that women exploit artisanal mining opportunities in ways that differ from those of men based on gender differences in land tenure relations. Customary and freehold tenure regimes—through their flexibility and place-based functionality—create unique income-generating and investment opportunities for women at artisanal gold mining sites in western Mali. Specifically, the unique labor demands and commercial aspects of artisanal gold extraction interact with the host-stranger dynamics of customary tenure regimes to create labor market opportunities that women are able to exploit. Mining income invested in freehold land property enables women to achieve or at least strive for a degree of financial autonomy that is difficult or impossible within the unequal gender relations that characterize other rural economic activities, especially agriculture. Customary and formal land tenure institutions play a complex role that both constrains and enables these livelihood strategies, which are based on geographic mobility and power-laden social relations within rural economies that are increasingly monetized.

1. Introduction Artisanal small-scale mining (ASM) has proven to be a viable and important livelihood activity for millions of people across sub-Saharan Africa (Bryceson and Jønsson, 2010; Fisher et al., 2009; Hilson et al., 2013; Tschakert, 2009). Although it is associated with rural poverty (Gamu et al., 2015; Hilson, 2012a), its popularity is driven by multifaceted livelihood strategies that bridge agrarian and urban economies in the region (Bryceson and MacKinnon, 2012). ASM nonetheless remains peripheral to the agendas of development donors (Hilson and McQuilken, 2014) and continues to be plagued by social concerns, most notably child labor participation and environmental impacts (Hilson, 2012b; Human Rights Watch, 2011; Maconachie and Hilson, 2016). However, an increasing number of scholars and policymakers acknowledge its important role as both a supplement (Cartier and Bürge, 2011; Hilson, 2016; Yakovleva, 2007) and substitute (Banchirigah and Hilson, 2010) for smallholder agriculture or as a stand-alone form of

⁎

employment (Bryceson and Jønsson, 2010; Tschakert, 2009). More specifically, ASM provides employment opportunities for social groups, including migrants (Grätz, 2009), youth (Howard, 2014; Maconachie and Hilson, 2016), and women (Jenkins, 2014; Lahiri-Dutt and Macintyre, 2006; Yakovleva, 2007) that are often marginalized within rural labor markets and institutions. Several studies have closely examined the important role of ASM within women’s livelihood strategies (Fisher, 2007; Kotsadam and Tolonen, 2016; Yakovleva, 2007). Although certain studies acknowledge the inadequacy of women’s access to land as a factor in their decision to become miners (Werthmann, 2009), none have investigated how the relationship between customary and formal land tenure regimes shape women’s opportunities and strategies in the ASM sector. Despite the growing emphasis on the complexity of land tenure relations (Meinzen-Dick et al., 2017) and an acknowledgement of the inadequacy of existing conceptual frameworks (Peters, 2009), researchers have paid inadequate attention to how individuals utilize tenure

Corresponding author. E-mail address: [email protected] (L.V. Brottem).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2019.07.005 Received 27 July 2018; Received in revised form 2 July 2019; Accepted 4 July 2019 0016-7185/ © 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Geoforum 105 (2019) 54–62

L.V. Brottem and L. Ba

regimes in differing ways and during different life stages as complimentary facets of their livelihood strategies. This article presents a new perspective on the participation of women in the ASM sector that contributes to debates on gendered resource access and livelihoods in sub-Saharan Africa. In doing so, it draws from and contributes to the field of feminist political ecology (Rocheleau et al., 1996; Elmhirst, 2011; Resurreccion and Elmhirst, 2012) as well as inter-disciplinary literatures on land resource tenure in sub-Saharan Africa (Cotula et al., 2007; Lavigne Delville, 2002; Meinzen-Dick et al., 2017; Peterman, 2012; Peters, 2004; Sikor and Lund, 2009). In terms of land tenure, it specifically considers how customary tenure regimes constrain women’s opportunities on family farms (Cooper, 2012; Evans, 2016; Peters, 2010) but, through different configurations, create them at artisanal gold mining sites. Additionally, it sheds light on how municipal institutions create land tenure opportunities that also shape women’s livelihood decisions at mining sites. This article builds on the framework of political ecology by expanding the livelihood scope to include mining with an emphasis on how its specific characteristics create new opportunities for women (De Bruijn et al., 2001; Elmhirst, 2011). It does so by expanding on previous rural livelihoods research through an emphasis on the dual role of land tenure relations within the ASM context. This research shows that women draw on two distinct facets of landed property (Schlager and Ostrom, 1992) to gain access to a lucrative resource (gold) and, in many cases, establish rights of alienation to land parcels through purchase and registration. These strategies reflect how long-term livelihood trajectories are differentially embedded within different tenure systems across time and space. Additionally, they reaffirm the continuing influence of neo-customary institutions (Van Bockstael, 2019) even as newly established municipalities play a growing role in the administration of formal property rights, including to women real estate owners. As rural economies become increasingly monetized (Lambin et al., 2014) and landed property becomes a more coveted asset (Cotula et al., 2004), the ways in which women and young men interact with these pluralistic land tenure regimes is becoming more important (MeinzenDick and Pradhan, 2002). Off-farm activities such as artisanal mining provide women with substantial income earning opportunities even as efforts to strengthen women’s land rights in Mali have faltered (JonesCasey et al., 2011). Mali’s recently passed agricultural law recognizes women’s unequal land tenure rights (https://www.iisd.org/blog/ historic-new-law-secures-land-malian-farmers, last accessed 12 June 2018) but does not address that inequality within rural households, which the failed 2009 family code revision sought to address (JonesCasey et al., 2011). In light of these persistent domestic inequalities, the analytical framework also places emphasis on the importance of geographic mobility (Mandel, 2004) and, specifically, the ability to leave one’s home village to establish an autonomous livelihood strategy (Bryceson and Geenen, 2016; De Bruijn et al., 2001). Mobility and land tenure relations are deeply intertwined (Lentz, 2013), including within the artisanal mining sector. In order to provide analytical clarity to these strategies, this article introduces the concept of the “tenure pivot space” in which mobile female miners utilize different strands of customary and freehold tenure to pursue their livelihoods and increase their autonomy. In this context, the pivot space is enmeshed in the geography of artisanal mining and broader political-economic changes that are impacting Mali and the rest of sub-Saharan Africa.

interview instruments were designed incrementally based on initial responses, informal input from miners, and observations made over the course of four field site visits during 2017 and 2018. A total of 126 miners were surveyed with a subset of them participating in semistructured interviews to acquire more detailed information about their overall livelihood strategies. Miners were approached randomly while working or resting on-site and were asked for permission to discuss their activities in accordance with standard research subject guidelines. The only sample frame employed was to survey or interview a proportional number of female miners who work at the mining sites. This was estimated to be approximately 30 percent. Data collection aimed to (1) gain a systematic and representative picture of individual mining employment in the broader context of livelihood and autonomy strategies among male and female miners; (2) understand investment strategies among successful miners who earned enough money to diversify their income sources; (3) acquire detailed information about the life strategies with particular attention to the role of agriculture in their childhood and adulthood. 2.1. Location and geographical context Data were collected at two mining sites in the Kenieba district of western Mali. Kenieba means sandy river in the local Malinké language and it hosts some of the country’s largest gold mines, which represent the country’s most important source of hard currency (www. worldbank.org/en/country/mali/overview, last accessed 20 July 2018). Gold has been exploited in the area for centuries and its commerce fueled the creation of pre-colonial empires (Kevane, 2015; Girard, 1992). The villages of Sanougou and Lengeikoto were the locations of the study’s survey and key informant interviews. These villages are situated at lower elevation in relation to the escarpments that characterize the landscape of Kenieba. Similar to other parts of Mali (Brottem, 2014), these communities share customary land tenure rights with villages located on the top of the escarpment from which they separated over a century ago (see also Duvall, 2006). Local people initially settled the lowlands to cultivate and hunt wild game with gold production serving as an important secondary activity. Until the 1990s, gold mining was limited by a lack of technology, remoteness of the sites, and fewer marketing opportunities available to miners. Since then, Kenieba has become more deeply incorporated into the national and regional transportation and commercial networks, most notably through the construction of a paved highway and a bridge over the Bafing River that link the Malian capital of Bamako with neighboring Senegal. At the same time, rural populations have increased even as agriculture has declined as a livelihood, which has increased the attractiveness of mining as an income-generating activity. The result is that mining has come to dominate the local economy with high levels of in-migration, the construction of improvised camps and more established settlements becoming mini boomtowns. 2.2. Background 2.2.1. Resource tenure rights and artisanal mining In terms of the relationship between mining, resource tenure, and institutions, scholarly literature has emphasized national policies, such as mining codes, and the strategies supported by multilateral institutions, especially the World Bank. Mali’s Mining Code, which was adopted in 2012, recognizes ASM as a legitimate livelihood. Although certain development organizations, notably the UN Development Program (UNDP), have since provided some support to artisanal miners (www.knowledge.uneca.org/ASM/ml, last accessed 25 July 2018), the sector has received negligible attention compared with agriculture and other rural livelihood activities. Development interventions in the ASM sector have relied on approaches such as the establishment of miners’ associations (Huggins et al., 2017), artisanal-industrial actor relations (Bush, 2009), and the

2. Materials and methods This analysis is based on an open-ended qualitative approach to understanding the interactions between rural livelihood strategies, geographic mobility, and tenure relations in the context of agriculture and artisanal gold mining in Mali. Informed by the methodological framework of progressive contextualization (Vayda, 1983), survey and 55

Geoforum 105 (2019) 54–62

L.V. Brottem and L. Ba

formalization of artisanal mining claims (Hilson et al., 2013; Graulau, 2008). Missing from these efforts is the important role of local customary institutions, which, in Mali, exercise day-to-day control over mineral resources. Although the Malian state technically possesses mineral rights, Malian customary authorities, operating through the institution of autochthony, control everyday access to sub-surface minerals, such as gold, in the same way that they govern the land that contains them (Nyame and Blocher, 2010). In terms of public services, especially law enforcement, the state is weak or absent in this article’s study areas where ASM is practiced. Municipalities are responsible for tax collection and work in concert with customary authorities to extract rents from mining activities. According to interviews conducted for this study, law enforcement officials, known in Francophone Africa as gendarmes, are not welcome at ASM sites because they are associated with conflict and theft. Instead, miners and customary authorities work together to support a local, informal system of policing and rule enforcement. The resulting system keeps the state at a distance and, as a result, further strengthens customary institutions. A comprehensive review of customary land tenure in West Africa is beyond the scope of this article so its point of departure is the institution of host-stranger relations (Kuba and Lentz, 2006). Clan groups exercise rights of autochthony based on historical claims to first occupancy of vaguely defined territories and the resources they contain, including sub-surface minerals. Over time, other groups and individuals settle and exploit these lands based on relatively secure allochthonous rights. These groups may stay for generations but they retain the designation of stranger in relation to their autochthonous hosts (ibid). The result is a flexible system of land access that also characterizes exploitation rights in present-day gold mining sites in Mali.

the mineshafts and/or carry them to the processing units, receive one bucket out of ten that they handle rather than a portion of the earnings. 2.2.3. Women’s tenure and mining Given that customary institutions govern access to mining resources, women occupy a secondary and subservient role in the ASM labor hierarchy (Jenkins, 2014; Werthmann, 2009; Fisher, 2007; Keita, 2001). Unlike the other ASM participants, they do not earn in proportion to how much gold is extracted but instead practice a kind of freelance piecework that may earn them substantial sums or nothing at all. Fisher (2007) and Werthmann (2009) have described the injustice and inequality of these labor arrangements so this analysis focuses instead on how women secure employment at mining sites, how much women earn working as miners, and what they do with their earnings. Feminist political ecology and cognate fields of inquiry (Elmhirst, 2011; Meinzen-Dick et al., 2014; Rocheleau et al., 1996) have explored these types of gendered tenure relations but have not fully engaged with the specific dynamics of female artisanal mining. The data presented in this article indicate that ASM represents a different expression of customary tenure relations, where men more clearly occupy the role of strangers and women hold a more ambiguous but relatively autonomous niche that is specific to the characteristics of the local ASM economy. These characteristics include the geographic isolation of mining sites, the high labor demands of artisanal mining, and the rapid, continuous pace of ore extraction. In terms of the geographical distribution of mining sites, ASM is limited to a small number of locations in Mali and neighboring countries (Keita, 2001). However, miners surveyed in this study originate from nearly every part of the country (see Fig. 2) plus several of its neighbors, which has created a cosmopolitan labor market that is comparable to ASM sites in eastern Africa (Bryceson and Jønsson, 2010). As noted in other studies (Keita, 2001; Tallichet et al., 2004; Yakovleva, 2007), women represent a significant portion of the labor force directly engaged in mining. Although most women travel to ASM sites with their husbands and children, many do so alone. The dynamics of this solo female labor migration is not a matter of pure exploitation although some do take jobs that would be deemed exploitative such as sex work. Female miners describe extra-marital relations with men known locally as petit mariage. These arrangements represent another way in which relationships shape resource access at mining sites. As reported by Werthmann (2009), these relationships represent a way to gain physical protection and material benefits (e.g., the male partner provides food to the woman). Female interviewees also describe the practice as allowing women, in certain instances, to double their share of the material being hauled out of mining pits from one to two out of ten buckets. Petit mariage relationships are therefore a pragmatic strategy to reduce risk and maximize benefit in a highly uncertain workplace. The isolated geography of ASM sites also influences mining as a livelihood strategy for women. The fact that women are often hundreds of kilometers from their families insulates them from the everyday financial pressure of the household. Although virtually all interviewees claimed to voluntarily send money to their extended families, they held the power to do so or not. The labor intensity of artisanal mining ensures that these women have opportunities at the bottom of the labor hierarchy. As new mining pits are established and prospectors deepen their holes, there is in ongoing demand for individuals to haul ore. As long as males prefer to work as diggers, women will continue to find remunerative employment at ASM sites. Labor demand is also driven by the use of pumps, introduced over the last two decades, which enable prospectors to return to former sites where groundwater historically prevented the deepening and expansion of shafts. Mechanical water pumping also enables miners to work during the rainy season, despite the protestations of the government and families that count on young members to return home and serve as

2.2.2. ASM resource access and labor relations Customary rights to exploit gold in West Africa function in a way that is comparable to other forms of land use such as cultivation and livestock grazing. A hopeful miner introduces himself to the village chief and makes contact with an autochthonous host, known as a tuteur or jaatigi, who then acts as an interlocutor and will provide the miner with room, board, and social support. Prospectors then approach members of the customary police force, known in the local Malinké language as Tomboloman, who authorize them to find a digging site that adheres to the local regulations. These include a five-meter minimum distance from the nearest mining pit. The Tomboloman will also ensure that the new hole is in line with the others in a way that will maximize the likelihood of finding gold. As a reflection of the open nature of customary resource access in the area, the miner is not required to pay a fee to begin mining. Instead, community representatives, including the village chief, land chief and the Tomboloman association receive approximately ten percent of the miners’ earnings, which represents a monetization of customary tenure relations that is not evident in other activities such as cash crop agriculture. The Tomboloman associations also reflect the same phenomenon of self-organization and collective action among diverse individuals observed at artisanal gold mines in northern Bénin (Grätz, 2009), Liberia, the Democratic Republic of Congo (Verbrugge et al., 2015), other world regions (Verbrugge, 2016). Labor relations, despite being embedded within the same customary tenure relations, function differently compared with agriculture. When the mine is up and running, it operations like a joint stock company. Many individuals, including women, stake ownership claims and then hire a team of miners to do the physical work. The owner will finance the operations, including the purchase of materials (pick axes, rope, buckets, etc.) and take fifty percent of the earnings. The rest of the earnings are divided up as follows: Mining teams receive approximately 25% of the earnings while the rest is shared between the Balandona, who construct and maintain mineshaft scaffolding (10%) and the Tiguèlikèla, who assure that the miners are digging in the right direction (5%). The individuals, mostly women, who haul buckets of ore out of 56

Geoforum 105 (2019) 54–62

L.V. Brottem and L. Ba

agricultural labor. All of these factors contribute to the unique ability of women to earn money as ASM miners. This ability is only limited by their physical capacity to transport buckets of ore and their luck that those buckets will contain gold. Female miners process their ore using the traditional method of cleaning and sifting with a dried gourd (nara dama) or by utilizing one of the crushing machines found on site. Since mines operate six days per week, demand for female labor is steady. This stands as a contrast to agriculture, which is limited to the rainy season, and market gardening, which is impacted by market saturation and low prices that reduce its income generation potential. In terms of non-agricultural activities, mining is much more remunerative than the kinds of small-scale commerce that are typically available to women. Moreover, since representatives of gold buyers in the capital city are on site, female miners can quickly convert their earnings to cash, which they keep on their persons.

compare their plans for making a living after they stopped working at the mine with an emphasis on how they would use any earnings they were able to save. These questions were based on the frequent response by men and women that mining was only a temporary activity that “did not have a future”. A third and final effort was a questionnaire administered to women in order to understand how they accessed the mining labor market and the role that customary land tenure relations played in that access. Those questions were inspired by the observation that women successfully entered the ASM labor market and were able to earn substantial income as miners. Given that customary tenure relations still govern mining sites, the team felt it was important to understand how women negotiated these, given that they typically access land resources through relations with men. Additional open-ended interviews were conducted with eight female interviewees with a specific focus on the relationship between household agricultural production and their own decisions to take up artisanal mining. Conversation topics included the viable of agriculture as an income-generating activity, their access to family land holdings, inheritance rights, household labor obligations, and opportunities to diversify their income sources through cash crops or alternative income sources.

2.2.4. Land titles and female autonomy Customary land tenure relations enable women to access employment opportunities at ASM sites but the prospect of freehold tenure rights to a parcel of land drives many women’s investment decisions once they make money as miners. Several studies have described female financial success and empowerment in the ASM context without considering the enabling role of freehold land tenure. The land tenure literature, for its part, has emphasized how women are marginalized within customary tenure regimes (Whitehead and Tsikata, 2003; Toulmin et al., 2001) and tenure formalization programs (Benjaminsen et al., 2009; Meinzen-Dick and Mwangi, 2009). By focusing on the household and community scales or specific land titling programs, these analyses have overlooked the livelihood strategies, which include landbased, non-agricultural activities such as mining, that women practice in different locations by exploiting the bundle of resource access and labor rights that they control (Razavi, 2009; Zevenbergen et al., 2013). Evidence from this study indicates that formalized freehold land rights may represent an opportunity for some women to break free from the constraints of familial customary tenure relations (Tripp, 2004), especially inheritance systems that favor male heirs (Evans, 2016) and can contribute to intergenerational poverty (Cooper, 2012; Lambert et al., 2014). Nonetheless, a land title or formal attestation of purchase does not eliminate the risk of dispossession (Varley, 2007) and it can be complicated to acquire one. Women must first save enough money to purchase a parcel of land, which vary in price depending on its location and utility, and successfully navigate the administrative process. Moreover, land speculation has driven up prices in rural Mali, especially along paved roadways and other high-traffic areas where it is possible to open a business. This benefits property owners but makes entry into the market more difficult.

3. Results The survey revealed a distinctly gender-based division of labor. Specifically, men work as diggers (85% of total) and women pull the buckets of ore from the holes (98% of total). For men, digging also typically involves bucket hauling. Only four males stated that they only work as a bucket hauler. Four other male respondents use a metal detector to help miners find new digging locations and this activity was described as a way to use earnings to avoid the hard labor of working in the pits. No female respondents described working with a metal detector. Another occupation that was limited to men was the construction and maintenance of mineshaft scaffolding. On the other hand, only women transport the ore to the processing units. Seven men and four women stated that they owned pits. Table 1 shows that both female and male miners earn sums that are comparable to those described in other studies (Bryceson and Jønsson, 2010; Lange, 2006; Yakovleva, 2007) and significantly larger than what they would earn working in agriculture or small-scale (petite) commerce. In general, these figures should be interpreted as qualitative estimates that provide descriptive information about ASM-based income generation. Although women show larger monthly earning on average than men, this figure does not concur with existing literature on women artisanal miners and key informant accounts collected on site, which describe women as generally earning less than their male counterparts. Mean per month values reveal an approximate rate of earning per time spent at the mine but it should not be interpreted as a monthly average income since gold strikes are highly sporadic. Further, these values are influenced by a few outliers, as evidenced by the discrepancies between the mean and median values. Among female miners, excluding a single exceptional case—a woman who reportedly earned more than $13,000 US in under a month—produces an average that is lower than that of male miners ($91.55 versus $98.55 per month) and more consistent with other studies.

2.3. Survey and open-ended interviews A local research team comprised of two trained data collectors administered a survey of 126 miners and open-ended interviews with customary authorities at the two mining sites. After seeking approval for local authorities, the team conducted the survey and a series of semi-structured interviews at the two selected mining sites. The team used the meetings with local authorities as opportunities to discuss local settlement history as it pertains to resource access and tenure relations at the artisanal gold mining sites. The survey collected basic personal information and included questions that aimed to elucidate: (1) how much the individual had earned as a miner, (2) how long they had engaged in artisanal mining, (3) reasons for pursuing mining, (4) other potential income-generating activities, and (5) association with other miners from the same communities of origin. The team followed up the initial survey with two subsequent rounds of data collection. A subsequent survey was conducted with 71 of the individuals (34 women and 37 men) in order to

Table 1 Duration of stay at mine (years) and earnings (total and monthly in USD) among male and female miners.*

All Men Women

Total

Duration

Mean earned

Median earned

Mean per month

117 79 38

3.2 3.3 3.0

4122.9 4716.2 2889.3

1667 2500 1583

105.12 98.55 118.78

* [9 did not respond (6 men, 3 women)]. 57

Geoforum 105 (2019) 54–62

L.V. Brottem and L. Ba

50 45 40 35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0

50 45 40 35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0

Women (N=42)

Men (N=84)

Fig. 1. Categorized reasons for traveling to mine site to work as an artisanal miner.

3.1. Reasons for mining

3.2. Alternatives to mining: credit and investment

Respondents gave a wide range of reasons for turning to mining as a livelihood activity. Fig. 1 provide these reasons disaggregated by gender. Taken together, the reasons fit the broad pattern of a pressing need for increased income, poverty, and lack of opportunity that has been reported by other studies. In response to the question “What are your reasons for coming to the mine?”, the most frequent response (N = 59) focused on the need to make money. Respondents expressed this in ways that relate to poverty (“lack of money”, “lack of alternatives”) or ambition (“seeking my fortune”, “making money quickly”) or the need for investment capital for a business. Poverty was the second most cited reason (N = 19). Men and women both described poverty in various ways such as “suffering”, “inability to meet my family’s needs” or simply “poverty”. Seventeen men but no women specifically mentioned unemployment as a reason for taking up mining. In several cases, other jobs fell through or they failed school exams and could not find a job. Two women mentioned dropping out of school but not in reference to unemployment. Reasons that were cited by women but not men included family obligations, divorce, and widowhood. Twelve women described coming to the mine with either their mother or their husband. Three women described widowhood and three described divorce as the reason they decided to take up artisanal gold mining. Interviewees described mining as source of financial independence for divorcees who must otherwise depend on relatives for support. Certain individuals added that the sites themselves provide divorcees with a “refuge” from the social and family stigma attached to the practice in rural Mali. Ten male and two female individuals expressed “curiosity” or a desire for “adventure”, using the same term that describes international migration among young West Africans. Descriptions of adventure also echoed that of unemployment as young men described the need to be independent and help support their families. The geography of miners’ communities of origin, shown in Fig. 2, indicate that artisanal gold mining is a broad-based phenomenon in Mali. It does not display the geographical patterns of chain migration or links to specific risks relating to climate or security that would cause people from specific districts or communities to come to the mines. A lack of community-based associations at mining sites provides further evidence that mining is an individual and, to a lesser degree familybased, livelihood strategy. Although nearly all miners declared that they sent money home to their families, almost none of them described any kind of formal hometown associations, which can typically be found among Malians living in regional cities and in Europe (Daum, 1998). Mining communities are organized in a much more cosmopolitan fashion that is similar what Bryceson and Geenen (2016) describe in the mining areas of Tanzania and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Credit: Given that so many respondents described a need for money as a principal reason for mining, the follow-up survey included a question on miners’ awareness or use of alternative sources of finance. Only one individual responded affirmatively that they had access to another source of finance. Negative responses included: “you need collateral/a guarantee [to receive a loan]”, “it is not for the poor”, “it is only for bosses [the rich]”, and “I am illiterate so I cannot access them.” Four women specifically described that credit was only available to cotton farmers through the national parastatal company. Although some women do grow cotton, interviewees described a lack of time due to their household work obligations as a primary impediment to this and, more generally, their ability to invest in agriculture. The majority of respondents simply stated that they do not have access to other sources of finance. Investment: Men and women provided sharply divergent responses to the open-ended question: “How would you use your earnings from mining in another income-generating activity?” A total of 82 men and 39 women responded to this question. Overall, 89% of the respondents had plans that ranged from working as mechanics, drivers, masons, welders, opening restaurants, investing in various kinds of commerce to mechanized agriculture and livestock production. Only three women (8% of total) provided agriculture as a response and two of them specified traditional food crops: peanuts and rice. All three expressed interest in gardening as an income-generating activity. One women responded that she was currently investing her earnings in cattle in her home village in the district of Koutiala. Commerce was by far the most attractive option for women. Commercial ventures described by women ranged from large-scale refrigerated imports, textiles importing, to the small-scale petite commerce that already represents a dominant activity among West African women. Several women described being involved in commerce and mining as a way to reinvest in their businesses or expand them to Kenieba. Eight female miners originally from agricultural villages provided additional, detailed commentary about their lack of interest in investing in farming. They described their decisions in terms of land and labor constraints on their family farms. In each case, they were given access to farmland controlled by the male household head, typically their father or husband. Interviews described that they would be given more land if they asked for it and if it were available but that their other domestic duties make such expansion impractical. The principal reason given is their limited access to family labor. Women have little to no control over their sons and exercise only partial control over their daughters’ labor, which is split between fieldwork and household responsibilities such as cooking, childcare, wood collecting, and other chores. 58

Geoforum 105 (2019) 54–62

L.V. Brottem and L. Ba

Fig. 2. Municipalities of origin for surveyed artisanal miners.

One interviewee’s personal trajectory provides an illustrative example of this. This individual described her household responsibilities at each life stage, which are typical for Malian girls and women in rural areas. From age five until ten, she would accompany her youngest siblings to her mother’s fields and look after them until they fell asleep. At that point, she would join her mother for plowing, weeding, or other tasks. From the age of ten until marriage, she would work with the other children, including boys, for the head of household doing all types of agricultural work in the family field. This included seeding, weeding, protecting the fields from pests, and harvesting crops. Young women are at a particular disadvantage in rural areas because this gendered division of labor that characterizes agricultural households is also hierarchical. Once married, they are typically obliged to take on the domestic work responsibilities of their mothers-inlaw, which limits their capacity to earn income through agriculture. After two years of marriage, women are typically given a field with the understanding that she will produce or sell part of her harvest to put food on the table and pay for her own and her children’s everyday expenses. Interviewees also described that mothers with daughters must eventually earn enough money to pay for a trousseau, a set of clothing and textiles that newlywed women bring to their husband’s household. Women’s disadvantaged control of land and labor explain their tendency to farm peanuts, which are less labor intensive than other crops and more easily accommodate their domestic work schedules. Peanut farming, however, does not provide access to the inputs (fertilizer, herbicide) that are needed to increase production, which would also require more labor. As a result, all interviewees described cultivating approximately one hectare of land, which contributes to their family’s food security but provides little opportunity to increase their income or financial independence. Peanut farming provides an important contrast with women’s earning potential as artisanal gold miners. With only one hectare of

land, women in Mali can expect to produce between 800 and 900 kg (kg). From that she will keep up to two-thirds for household consumption and sell up to 300 kg to earn approximately 150–175 US dollars. In light of the very limited potential to expand this income, which is inadequate even without accounting for unforeseen expenses, many women describe artisanal gold mining as a more attractive activity. More importantly, fewer than ten percent of female miners (Table 2) plan to invest in agriculture if and when they earn enough working at the pits. The interviewee who took care of her siblings and weeded the family fields as a young girl illustrates this logic, which is rooted in financial security and autonomy. She eventually married but quickly found herself in a vulnerable position when she lost both her parents and came into conflict with her husband. Concern for her six brothers and a desire to escape her domestic situation led her to travel more than more 800 km from Sikasso to Kenieba, where a friend met her and took her to the gold mines the next day. She was immediately introduced to a host and a pit owner who agreed to let her begin working. She began by hauling buckets out of the pits but began transporting them as well. She relied on other women to teach her how to identify gold ore nuggets and over time learned how to do so effectively. She describes the mines as a predatory environment and that petit mariage relationships are almost a necessity for woman to ensure they will have opportunities for a gold strike and not be taken advantage of by male miners. In five years of mining, this individual has earned $3300 US. She is currently Table 2 Investment strategies.

Men Women

59

Total

Agriculture

Livestock

Professional

Commerce

No Plans

84 39

33% 8%

14% 3%

23% 28%

21% 59%

8% 3%

Geoforum 105 (2019) 54–62

L.V. Brottem and L. Ba

Index https://www.genderindex.org/country/mali-2014-results/, last accessed 10 April 2019) and the rest are deprived of the principal means of creating new or expanding existing income sources. Men and women largely share the same aspirations of autonomy and financial well-being of their families. Yet, because of their unequal positions within rural production systems and tenure regimes, pursue distinct strategies to pursue them. In their pursuit of personal and financial autonomy, all miners must overcome the obstacle of meeting their own day-to-day needs and those of their families. This is evident in the absence of savings or investment strategy among a sizeable percentage of survey respondents as well as the near universality of frequent money transfers back to their families. When saving and investment are possible, members of both groups pursue commerce and real estate. The latter is not only a way to build a house for one’s family but it is also a way to earn income through rent or land speculation and hold an investment that can be bequeathed to one’s children.

Table 3 Current use of mining earnings.

Men Women

42 29

Agriculture

Livestock

Professional

Commerce

Real Estate

None

17% 3%

17% 3%

0 14%

10% 41%

19% 21%

38% 14%

saving money to build a house back in Sikasso where she can live with her brothers and work as a trader but not as a farmer. Table 2 shows that, in contrast with women, almost half (47%) of male respondents describe their future plans as involving either crop or livestock-based agriculture, most frequently integrated through an animal traction plow system. Livestock-based investment strategies ranged from the acquisition of a single pair of steers for animal traction to animal fattening operations and small ruminant trade. Male commercial ventures overlapped with those women, including textiles and horticultural trade, but also more male-dominated sectors such as used car part imports. Petite commerce was notably absent from male investment strategies. Overall, six percent of respondents described having no investment plans at the time of the survey. Table 3 provides the responses among 71 miners who are currently investing their earnings. These results reflect but also differ from the intended investment strategies presented in Table 2. They show that many males are already investing in agriculture, livestock, and commerce though not in professional endeavors. Women are actively investing in non-agricultural professions, especially restaurants and petite commerce at mining sites and surrounding communities. Approximately 20 percent of both males and females are actively investing in real estate: buying land and/or building houses or commercial buildings. Four out of eight of the males who have invested in real estate described concurrent investments in livestock. The number of males who are not yet investing their mining earnings is more than double that of women. Miners tend to be secretive about the amount of money they have invested and where their investments are located but the research team was able to identify five women who have purchased land with their earnings from mining. Four out of five of the women had purchased land in the city of Kenieba and one invested in Bamako. Although land parcels in Kenieba start at $275 US, the land acquired by women surveyed for this article ranged in price from $1000 to $8000 US. The lot in the capital city of Bamako was purchased for $2500 US. In all cases, women payed $3.50 US to receive a letter of attribution from the municipal administration. One interviewee described having a male confidant carry out the administrative procedure though the attribution was done in her name. None of the buyers obtained an actual land title, which involves a more onerous and expensive process that must be carried out in the capital city. One of the women, who purchased a total of three lots, has built on two of them and is currently renting out the buildings.

4.1. Divergent male and female investment strategies As current or future heads of households, men clearly utilize artisanal gold mining as a way to capitalize their crop and livestock production. Unlike women, men control access to land and labor via customary tenure relations and patriarchal family structures. Mining earnings increase men’s capacity to utilize these resources to provide for their families and, in doing so, reinforce their dominant positions within households and the rural communities where they live. This is critically important since men exercise a high degree of control over household labor, particularly their children, which they can allocate to agricultural production. Since polygamy is widespread in Mali, wealthier men can take more wives and devote more individuals to agriculture (Boserup et al., 2007) while concurrently pursuing the other, more capital-intensive enterprises listed in the results. Women, on the other hand, face a different set of constraints in their use of hard-earned capital to enhance their lives and those of their children. Their actual and intended investment strategies reflect these different challenges, as they relate to customary land resource tenure, polygamous household production, and the need to find secure and autonomous ways to earn money. Moreover, the results clearly reflect a lack of interest among women to continue pursuing agriculture. The poor income prospects described by several interviewees broadly reflect the difficulty or even impossibility of women to make the investments in equipment and inputs that are increasingly necessary to make a viable living as a farmer. Not only do women have less control over the labor needed to farm productively, they do not, in a practical sense, exercise strong rights to land. Although Malian women possess some statutory rights to land (Jones-Casey et al., 2011), these rights are hardly upheld in rural communities (see also Evans, 2016). Land heritage remains a patriarchal affair. When the male household head dies, the land remains under familial and, therefore, male control. This is especially important within polygamous households where a father’s assets may not be equitably distributed following his death (Van de Walle, 2013). Divorce is another potential situation that compels many women to seek a degree of financial autonomy through the acquisition of land or other property (Tripp, 2004). Widows and divorced women as well as their offspring have few rights within rural households and communities so women prepare accordingly by pursuing activities such as artisanal mining.

4. Conclusions These results shed light on the overlapping yet divergent livelihood strategies of young male and female miners. The survey responses broadly reflect a sentiment of financial discrimination against youth, women, and the poor, which is rooted in a political-economic reality in rural West Africa that is described in other studies (Lanie, 2017; Zins and Weill, 2016). As an illustrative example, agriculture employs 65% of Africa’s population and providing 32% of GDP but less than 1% of bank lending goes to the sector (http://spore.cta.int/en/article/youthdriving-agricultural-transformation-in-africa.html, last accessed 14 June 2018). This means that what little credit that does go to agriculture is channeled through male-dominated sectors like cotton. The result is that only 16% of creditors in Mali are women (OECD Gender

4.2. Land tenure as pivot space Most female miners see mining as a transitional activity. This study shows that even women who are open to staying indefinitely at ASM sites are actively pursuing alternative or complimentary ways of earning money. The results presented in this study shed light on the critical role of tenure relations within these livelihood trajectories, 60

Geoforum 105 (2019) 54–62

L.V. Brottem and L. Ba

which encompass a range of everyday basic needs, familial obligations, and personal aspirations. Specifically, the dual yet overlapping nature of customary and freehold land tenure provide women with a “pivot space” within which they can use their labor and earnings to exchange one set of tenure rights for another. In doing so, they can achieve, or at least aspire to a higher degree of autonomy for themselves and their offspring. Real estate investment represents a livelihood domain that is underinvestigated. The noteworthy proportion of women who aspire to purchase their own land reveals important intra-household and intergenerational dynamics related to female empowerment and autonomy. In short, land is an asset and a heritage that is much safer from husbands, fathers, and in-laws who have the power to strip women of their rightful assets when they are confined to a village and its customary power relations (Tripp, 2004). Further, the number of female individuals who have successfully purchased their own land indicates that it is a feasible strategy to which to aspire. Female miners understand that they may be only one gold strike away from their own real estate property. In this sense, customary and freehold property rights represent different forms of potential autonomy. Specifically, customary rights at ASM sites provide women with a partially autonomous form of resource access and freehold rights over purchased land provide a partially autonomous form of asset possession. The distinction between access versus possession is important because it clarifies how women exploit their bundles of tenure rights through their use of mobility-based livelihood strategies. Tenure rights provide women with a way to reconcile familial constraints such as reproduction and polygamous marriage, uncertainty and scarcity in the rural economic sphere, with their own personal aspirations. Access to ASM resources and employment opportunities are only partially autonomous because they remain embedded in host-stranger relations but also unequal gendered labor relations. Freehold ownership of land property is partial because women still depend on males in various positions of authority to carry out their transactions. Administrative decentralization in Mali has increased the feasibility of this strategy since municipalities are legally mandated to process land transactions. Since there are no statutory limitations to women owning land, municipalities administer their purchases and officials in Kenieba describe having assisted several women with their transactions. Moreover, the proximity of the municipal administration and the relative approachability of local officials is a striking contrast to doing business and administrative formalities in the capital city of Bamako.

being transformed by the livelihood shifts described in this article. Their legally plural character emerges not only from laws that create new formal rights (e.g., freehold land ownership) and codify longstanding customary ones (e.g., clan control of land), but also the everyday decision making that must reconcile these disparate spheres of rights. Women’s acquisition of real estate is an important example of this phenomenon, which requires more careful investigation by researchers interested in rural livelihoods. The search for money, as a way to make investments or simply feed one’s family because village resources are no long adequate, will only grow in importance. It is likely that this search will involve increasing numbers of women and could lead to very significant changes in gender relations in the coming years. Although development agencies have long sought to boost income and improve access to credit in rural communities, this article reveals new gender dynamics and new avenues for enhancing women’s rights and livelihood prospects. Declaration of Competing Interest The author confirms that there are no known conflicts of interest associated with this publication and there has been no significant financial support for this work that could have influenced its outcome. Acknowledgements Funding support from the Grinnell College Committee for the Support of Faculty Scholarship and the Grinnell College Harris Memorial Research Fellowship. Data collection assistance provided by Lassine Ba, Issa Traore, and Bakary Coulibaly. References Banchirigah, S.M., Hilson, G., 2010. De-agrarianization, re-agrarianization and local economic development: re-orientating livelihoods in African artisanal mining communities. Policy Sci. 43 (2), 157–180. Benjaminsen, T.A., Holden, S., Lund, C., Sjaastad, E., 2009. Formalisation of land rights: some empirical evidence from Mali, Niger and South Africa. Land Use Policy 26 (1), 28–35. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landusepol.2008.07.003. Boserup, E., Tan, S.T., Toulmin, C., 2007. Woman's role in economic development. Routledge, London. Brottem, L., 2014. Hosts, strangers and the tenure politics of livestock corridors in Mali. Africa: J. Int. Afr. Inst. 84 (4), 638–657. Bryceson, D., Geenen, S., 2016. Artisanal frontier mining of gold in Africa: labour transformation in Tanzania and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Afr. Affairs 115 (459), 296–317. Bryceson, D., Jønsson, J.B., 2010. Gold digging careers in rural East Africa: small-scale miners’ livelihood choices. World Develop. 38 (3), 379–392. Bryceson, D., MacKinnon, D., 2012. Eureka and beyond: mining's impact on African urbanisation. J. Contemp. Afr. Stud. 30 (4), 513–537. https://doi.org/10.1080/ 02589001.2012.719376. Bush, R., 2009. ‘Soon there will be no-one left to take the corpses to the morgue’: accumulation and abjection in Ghana's mining communities. Resour. Policy 34 (1–2), 57–63. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resourpol.2008.02.002. Cartier, L., Bürge, M., 2011. Agriculture and artisanal gold mining in Sierra Leone: alternatives or complements? J. Int. Develop. 23 (8), 1080–1099. Cooper, E., 2012. Women and Inheritance in Sub-Saharan Africa: what can change? Develop. Policy Rev. 30 (5), 641–657. Cotula, L., Chauveau, J.P., Cissé, S., Colin, J.P., Lavigne Delville, P., Neves, B., Quan, J., Toulmin, C., 2007. Changes in “customary” land tenure systems in Africa. London, Rome: International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO). Cotula, L., Toulmin, C., Hesse, C., 2004. Land Tenure and Administration in Africa: Lessons of Experience and Emerging Issues. International Institute for Environment and Development, London. Daum, C., 1998. Les associations de Maliens en France: migrations, développement et citoyenneté. Karthala Editions, Paris. De Bruijn, M., Van Dijk, R., Foeken, D., 2001. Mobile Africa: Changing Patterns of Movement in Africa and Beyond. Brill Academic Publishing, Leiden. Duvall, C., 2006. Villages, Vegetation, Bedrock, and Chimpanzees: Human and NonHuman Sources of Ecosystem Structure in Southwestern Mali. Geography, University of Wisconsin-Madison. Elmhirst, R., 2011. Introducing new feminist political ecologies. Geoforum 42 (2), 129–132. Evans, Ruth, 2016. Gendered struggles over land: shifting inheritance practices among the Serer in rural Senegal AU. Gender Place Cult. 23 (9), 1360–1375. https://doi.org/ 10.1080/0966369X.2016.1160872.

4.3. ASM, livelihoods, and local institutions These transactions and the livelihood strategies of which they are part reveal that new conceptual frameworks are needed to understand the role of land tenure relations in African rural livelihoods. In Mali, artisanal gold mining is a geographical configuration of gendered livelihood activities and property relations that blurs the distinction between customary and private. Women clearly remain embedded within customary tenure institutions via their familial (lineage, household) and productive (associations, farm labor) relationships, all of which are intertwined within the fabric of local communities. However, women who are able to travel to and work at ASM sites are able to gain a level of autonomy within those relationships that is difficult to achieve in other sectors or activities. This analysis shows that women intentionally seek that autonomy via various investment strategies, including real estate, which depends on their access to freehold property acquisition at the municipal level. A new conceptual framework that focuses on how monetization impacts land tenure relations will shed light on the evolving role of local institutions, especially municipalities that were established through democratic decentralization. In the West African context, these institutions increasingly function as legally plural regimes that are 61

Geoforum 105 (2019) 54–62

L.V. Brottem and L. Ba

IFPRI CAPRI working papers. IFPRI, Washington, DC. Mandel, J., 2004. Mobility matters: women's livelihood strategies in Porto Novo, Benin. Gender Place Cult. 11 (2), 257–287. https://doi.org/10.1080/ 0966369042000218482. Meinzen-Dick, R., Quisumbing, A., Doss, C., Theis, S., 2017. Women's land rights as a pathway to poverty reduction: framework and review of available evidence. Agric. Syst. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agsy.2017.10.009. Meinzen-Dick, R.S., Kovarik, C., Quisumbing, A., 2014. Gender and sustainability. Annu. Rev. Environ. Resour. 39. Meinzen-Dick, R.S., Mwangi, E., 2009. Cutting the web of interests: pitfalls of formalizing property rights. Land Use Policy 26 (1), 36–43. https://doi.org/10.1016/j. landusepol.2007.06.003. Nyame, F.K., Blocher, J., 2010. Influence of land tenure practices on artisanal mining activity in Ghana. Resour. Policy 35 (1), 47–53. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resourpol. 2009.11.001. Peterman, A., 2012. Widowhood and asset inheritance in Sub-Saharan Africa: empirical evidence from 15 countries. Develop. Policy Rev. 30 (5), 543–571. Peters, P., 2010. Our daughters inherit our land, but our sons use their wives' fields”: matrilineal-matrilocal land tenure and the New Land Policy in Malawi. J. Eastern Afr. Stud. 4 (1), 179–199. Peters, P., 2009. Challenges in land tenure and land reform in Africa. Anthropol. Contrib. 37 (8), 1317–1325. Peters, P., 2004. Inequality and social conflict over land in Africa. J. Agrarian Change 4 (3), 269–314. Razavi, S., 2009. Engendering the political economy of agrarian change. J. Peasant Stud. 36 (1), 197–226. Resurreccion, B.P., Elmhirst, R., 2012. Gender and Natural Resource Management: Livelihoods, Mobility and Interventions. Routledge. Rocheleau, D., Thomas-Slayter, B., Wangari, E., 1996. Feminist Political Ecology: Global Issues and Local Experiences, International Studies of Women and Place. Routledge, London; New York. Schlager, E., Ostrom, E., 1992. Property-rights regimes and natural resources: a conceptual analysis. Land Econ. 68 (3), 249–262. Sikor, T., Lund, C., 2009. Access and property: a question of power and authority. Develop. Change 40 (1), 1–22. Tallichet, S., Redlin, M., Harris, R., 2004. What’sa woman to do? Globalized gender inequality in small-scale mining. In: The Socio-economic Impacts of Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining in Developing Countries. Taylor & Francis, London, pp. 205–219. Toulmin, C., Lavigne Delville, P., Traoré, S., 2001. The dynamics of resource tenure in West Africa. James Currey, Oxford. Tripp, A.M., 2004. Women’s movements, customary law, and land rights in Africa: the case of Uganda. Afr. Stud. Quart. 7 (4), 1–19. Tschakert, P., 2009. Recognizing and nurturing artisanal mining as a viable livelihood. Resour. Policy 34 (1–2), 24–31. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resourpol.2008.05.007. Van Bockstael, S., 2019. Land grabbing “from below”? Illicit artisanal gold mining and access to land in post-conflict Côte d’Ivoire. Land Use Policy 81, 904–914. Van de Walle, D., 2013. Lasting welfare effects of widowhood in Mali. World Develop. 51, 1–19. Varley, A., 2007. Gender and property formalization: conventional and alternative approaches. World Develop. 35 (10), 1739–1753. Vayda, A., 1983. Progressive contextualization: methods for research in human ecology. Human Ecol. 11 (3), 265–281. Verbrugge, B., 2016. Voices from below: artisanal and small-scale mining as a product and catalyst of rural transformation. J. Rural Stud. 47, 108–116. Verbrugge, B., Cuvelier, J., Van Bockstael, S., 2015. Min(d)ing the land: the relationship between artisanal and small-scale mining and surface land arrangements in the southern Philippines, eastern DRC and Liberia. J. Rural Stud. 37, 50–60. Werthmann, K., 2009. Working in a boom-town: female perspectives on gold-mining in Burkina Faso. Resour. Policy 34 (1–2), 18–23. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resourpol. 2008.09.002. Whitehead, A., Tsikata, D.T., 2003. Policy discourses on women's land rights in SubSaharan Africa: the implications of the re–turn to the Customary. J. Agrarian Change 3 (1–2), 67–112. Yakovleva, N., 2007. Perspectives on female participation in artisanal and small-scale mining: a case study of Birim North District of Ghana. Resour. Policy 32 (1), 29–41. Zevenbergen, J., Augustinus, C., Antonio, D., Bennett, R., 2013. Pro-poor land administration: principles for recording the land rights of the underrepresented. Land Use Policy 31, 595–604. Zins, A., Weill, L., 2016. The determinants of financial inclusion in Africa. Rev. Develop. Finance 6 (1), 46–57.

Fisher, E., 2007. Occupying the margins: labour integration and social exclusion in artisanal mining in Tanzania. Develo. Change 38 (4), 735–760. Fisher, E., Mwaipopo, R., Mutagwaba, W., Nyange, D., Yaron, G., 2009. The ladder that sends us to wealth”: artisanal mining and poverty reduction in Tanzania. Resour. Policy 34 (1–2), 32–38. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resourpol.2008.05.003. Gamu, J., Le Billon, P., Spiegel, S., 2015. Extractive industries and poverty: a review of recent findings and linkage mechanisms. Extract. Indust. Soc. 2 (1), 162–176. Girard, J., 1992. “L'or du Bambouk.” Une dynamique de civilisation ouest-africaine. Du royaume de Gabou à la Casamance. Georg Editeur, Geneva. Graulau, J., 2008. ‘Is mining good for development?’ The intellectual history of an unsettled question. Progr. Develop. Stud. 8 (2), 129–162. Grätz, T., 2009. Moralities, risk and rules in West African artisanal gold mining communities: a case study of Northern Benin. Resour. Policy 34 (1–2), 12–17. https://doi. org/10.1016/j.resourpol.2008.11.002. Hilson, G., 2012a. Family hardship and cultural values: child labor in Malian small-scale gold mining communities. World Develop. 40 (8), 1663–1674. https://doi.org/10. 1016/j.worlddev.2012.03.017. Hilson, G., 2012b. Poverty traps in small-scale mining communities: the case of subSaharan Africa. Canadian J. Develop. Stud./Revue canadienne d'etudes du developpement 33 (2), 180–197. https://doi.org/10.1080/02255189.2012.687352. Hilson, G., 2016. Farming, small-scale mining and rural livelihoods in Sub-Saharan Africa: a critical overview. Extract. Indust. Soc. 3 (2), 547–563. Hilson, G., Amankwah, R., Ofori-Sarpong, G., 2013. Going for gold: transitional livelihoods in Northern Ghana. J. Modern Afr. Stud. 51 (1), 109–137. https://doi.org/10. 1017/S0022278X12000560. Hilson, G., McQuilken, J., 2014. Four decades of support for artisanal and small-scale mining in sub-Saharan Africa: a critical review. The Extract. Indust. Soc. 1 (1), 104–118. Howard, N., 2014. Teenage labor migration and antitrafficking policy in West Africa. Ann. Am. Acad. Political Social Sci. 653 (1), 124–140. https://doi.org/10.1177/ 0002716213519242. Huggins, C., Buss, D., Rutherford, B., 2017. A ‘cartography of concern’: place-making practices and gender in the artisanal mining sector in Africa. Geoforum 83, 142–152. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2016.09.009. Human Rights Watch, 2011. A Poisonous Mix: Child Labor, Mercury, and Artisanal Gold Mining in Mali. Human Rights Watch, New York. Jenkins, K., 2014. Women, mining and development: an emerging research agenda. Extract. Indust. Soc. 1 (2), 329–339. Jones-Casey, K., Knox, A., Chenitz, Z., 2011. Women, inheritance and Islam in Mali. In: Focus on Land in Africa. Seattle: Landesa. Keita, S., 2001. Étude sur les mines artisanales et les exploitations minières a petite échelle au Mali. International Institute for Environment and Development. London, London. Kevane, M., 2015. Gold mining and economic and social change in West Africa. In: Monga, C., Lin, J.Y. (Eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Africa and Economics. Oxford University Press, Oxford. Kotsadam, A., Tolonen, A., 2016. African mining, gender, and local employment. World Develop. 83, 325–339. Kuba, R., Lentz, C., 2006. Land and the politics of belonging in West Africa, African Social Studies Series. Brill, Leiden. Lahiri-Dutt, K., Macintyre, M., 2006. Women Miners in Developing Countries: Pit Women and Others. Ashgate Publishing Ltd. Lambert, S., Ravallion, M., Van de Walle, D., 2014. Intergenerational mobility and interpersonal inequality in an African economy. J. Develop. Econ. 110, 327–344. Lambin, E., D’haen, S.A., Mertz, O., Østergaard Nielsen, J., Rasmussen, K., 2014. Scenarios on future land changes in the West African Sahel. Geografisk TidsskriftDanish J. Geogr. 114 (1), 76–83. Lange, S., 2006. Benefit Streams from Mining in Tanzania: Case Studies from Geita and Mererani. Lanie, T., 2017. Demand-driven determinants and self-reported barriers to financial inclusion in the West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU). J. Econ. Int. Finance 9 (11), 120–130. Lavigne Delville, P., 2002. Negotiating Access to Land in West Africa: A Synthesis of Findings from Research on Derived Rights to Land, Land Tenure and Resource Access in West Africa. London: International Institute for Environment and Development IIED. Lentz, C., 2013. Land, Mobility, and Belonging in West Africa: Natives and Strangers. Indiana University Press, Bloomington. Maconachie, R., Hilson, G., 2016. Re-thinking the child labor “problem” in rural subSaharan Africa: the case of Sierra Leone’s half shovels. World Develop. 78, 136–147. Meinzen-Dick, R.S., Pradhan, R., 2002. Legal pluralism and dynamic property rights. In:

62