The mining industry has failed to provide adequate remedies for the harm it causes, a critical issue discussed at the Investing in African Mining Indaba earlier this month. Speaking at the event, Jan Morrill, Mining Programme Co-Director at Earthworks, emphasised the urgent need for mining companies to take responsibility.
“There’s a real need to address the historic harms of the mining industry and the continuing harms of the mining industry,” Morrill stated. She underscored that governments must “pass and enforce regulation that prevents harms from occurring,” including stringent air and water quality standards, human rights protections, and safeguards for Indigenous peoples’ rights.
Beyond regulations, she stressed that governments should ensure “there are sanctions or avenues for sanctions in place to hold mining companies to account when harms do occur.” These sanctions, she said, must act as “a deterrent for causing harm in communities and ecosystems.”
Morrill also called on mining companies to improve grievance mechanisms and fully acknowledge their impact. “They need to engage impacted communities in the solutions and in the remedy to address the harms that they cause,” she explained. She highlighted the necessity for communities to have access to independent technical experts to help them understand mining’s consequences.
Investors and metal purchasers, she added, “need to take remedy very seriously” and ensure that when harm occurs, there is an “adequate and effective solution that includes the people who have been impacted and is commensurate with the harm that has been caused.”
Morrill warned that without significant changes, the world risks repeating past mistakes in the shift to renewable energy. “We are poised to repeat the mistakes of the past if we don’t make significant changes,” she cautioned. However, she believes the industry stands at a turning point: “If we really look and change the systems that have been in place, we can move forward in a way that doesn’t repeat the harms of the past.”
