Description
Tanzania is a resource rich country. Mining of gold, copper, diamonds, coal and natural gases make up over half of the country's total exports. However, this wealth does not reach the most marginalised people, with the country’s poverty line standing at 50.4%.
Extractive industries are the businesses that take raw materials, including oil, coal, gold, iron, copper and other minerals, from the earth. Examples of extractive processes include oil and gas extraction, mining, dredging and quarrying.
In the extractive industry, conflicts between investors and communities are common. Misunderstandings or limited knowledge of community needs and interests causes tension between communities and mining companies. Inadequate policy implementation perpetuates human rights abuses, child labour, corruption, social exclusion, gender pay gaps and environmental degradation, putting the local community at risk of losing land to private investors without compensation.
Patriarchal systems make the exclusion of women, youth and people with disabilities worse, preventing them from benefiting from mining investment opportunities.
Youth, women, and people with disabilities can play a powerful role in demanding rights and equal access to information and justice in the extractive industry. Volunteers help these marginalised groups to gain a fair income by giving them the necessary skills, assets and aspirations for full, equal and effective participation in the industry. This includes helping them to realise their right to quality jobs, income, social inclusion, protection and civil society support.
CLARITY also works to strengthen accountability with the community, private sector, and government and encourage responsible business practices within the extractive sector, including access to employment rights.
How we do this:
- We support people to access justice for human rights violations in the extractive sector by linking them up with human rights agencies;
- Work with informal artisanal women miners to improve their working conditions, seek justice for gender-based violence, and improve incomes through a pilot on small-scale artisanal mining enterprise;
- Support the transition away from polluting industries by working with youth volunteers to start a dialogue around other livelihoods possibilities.