Ervin, Junta Directiva Mayo 2011

December 2012

Ervin Rentería, board member of ARM since the organization was founded in 2004, has resigned from the board of directors to dedicate his time to new projects in development of Artisanal and Small-scale Mining (ASM). Ervin has been part of our initiative since its very beginning; even before ARM existed, he was part of the network for responsible mining RESPOMIN, a regional partnership between scientists, NGO representatives, government representatives and the private sector.  With his experiences from Oro Verde Ervin brought a lot of knowledge to the table in the network.

Internally, Ervin will always be known for the sentence “seguimos caminando” (we keep on walking)  first time uttered years ago as an answer to a nervous board of directors unsure about the future for their plans for gold certification. Since then, it has become almost a mantra in ARM, and a symbol of pushing through and keeping calm no matter what obstacles might be in the way.

To fill the spot Ervin has left behind, the board has appointed Harbi Guerrero, miner, economist and financial administrator, from Nariño Colombia. Harbi is president of ASOMIRCOL, Asociación por la Minería Responsable y Comercio Justo del Suroccidente Colombiano, which was created by miners and local organizations from the area to work towards Fairtrade and Fairmined (FT&FM) certification. As president he has represented miners and ASOMIRCOL in ARMs international workshops on the Fairtrade and Fairmined (FT&FM) standard in different countries of Latin America and Africa. In 2005, as manager of the COODMILLA LTDA, a miners coorperative in La Llanada, Harbi obtained an agreement with regional and local governments for the establishment of a commercial platform for the cooperative, generating significant benefits to the mining community of the region.

We welcome Harbi and thank him for the decision to join the board of Directors. At the same time we thank Ervin for the time and effort he has put into the initiative. We promise that we will keep on walking towards making our shared vision of a responsible, formalized, profitable and sustainable Artisanal and Small-scale Mining sector a reality for all ASM miners.

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