May 2012
Congratulations to the Comunidad Aurifera Relave S.A. (AURELSA) in Peru for reaching the Fairtrade and Fairmined certification!
AURELSA is located in village of Relave, in the district of Pullo, province of Parinacochas, department of Ayacucho. During the mid-1980s, many families and individuals displaced by violence and economic hardship came to the region in the Peruvian Atacama desert in search of a livelihood and settled as informal miners working on the tailings (relaves) left by previous mining operations.
In 1986, they formed the Asociación de Mineros Artesanales de Relave with 200 miners and started building the village. They gained governmental recognition as a settlement annex in 1993, the first step towards having a school, seeking the guidance of authorities and professionals to improve their mining methods and engaging with the Ministry of Mines. To access mining titles, they were advised to form a private company and invited the whole community to join their collective effort; however, only 86 individuals chose to invest their time and money in creating AURELSA. The company was subsequently established on 26 July 1997 with 78 men and eight women, holding mineral rights over 1,000 hectares.
Since then, they have put a lot of hard work into developing their livelihoods and the community. For the past four years, ARM has had the pleasure of supporting and collaborating with AURELSA in their work to comply with the Fairtrade and Fairmined Standard, and we are happy to congratulate them on this great achievement. AURELSA is the fifth mining organization to reach the Fairtrade and Fairmined certification.