ABSTRACT
This chapter critically reflects on the challenges with implementing microcredit programmes for communities engaged in artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) – low-tech, labour-intensive mineral extraction and processing activity – in impoverished rural African environments. 2 To date, significant support in the form of technological assistance and education has been provided for ASM activities in a number of countries across sub-Saharan Africa. It has been disseminated by host governments, and a range of multilateral and bilateral organizations, including the World Bank, UK Department for International Development (DFID) and various departments of the United Nations. The impact of this support, however, has been minimal, in large part because a significant share of it has been earmarked exclusively for miners who are in possession of a licence. The vast majority of people who engage in ASM work in sub-Saharan Africa cannot access this support: according to the data presented in the literature (ILO, 1999; Hentschel et al., 2002; Hilson and Potter 2005), at least 90 per cent of the region's ASM workforce operates illegally on unlicensed plots of land.
