Fairtrade Foundation promotes roundtable to debate ways to make mining more sustainable

Fairtrade Foundation’s Martine Parry is visiting Geita, in Tanzania, to check the group’s first gold projects in the area. In this town, one in four people depend on gold mining to survive, so the local mines hope to get Fairtrade accreditation as soon as possible, which might happen next year.

Currently, the experts in the area – which are part of a Fairtrade project, funded by Comic Relief - are raising awareness among the miners and explaining how they can improve their working and living conditions. However, there are many problems in the region: child labour, lack of safety equipment, use of hazardous materials like cyanide and mercury, dust inhalation and noise pollution.

http://www.911metallurgist.com/blog/fairtrade-foundation-promotes-roundtable-to-debate-ways-to-make-mining-more-sustainable