September 2011
In the Nariño department, Southern Colombia, the artisanal and small scale mining has been practiced for over 80 years. Cooperatives and associations group miners who work under concessions granted by the mining authorities over 30 years ago.
However, the miners in the community now feel that, because of the restrictive character of the Forest Law of 1959, the renewal of the mining licenses will not be possible.
In these municipalities the ASM constitutes a fundamental source of income for more than 10,000 families and its disappearing would bring serious social and economic consequences.
The report of Harbi Guerrero Morillo explores this difficult situation and calls for a more flexible legislation, which would assure favourable conditions for the development of responsible community mining.
Harbi Guerrero Morillo is a small-scale miner entrepreneur and a president of ASOMIRCOL, an organization which promotes Fairtrade and Fairmined initiative in the Nariño region.