Four Decades of Efforts to Reduce or Eliminate Mercury Pollution in Artisanal Gold Mining

Throughout the past four decades, most projects related to mercury in Artisanal Gold Mining (AGM) have been dedicated to monitoring the environmental and health impacts of the activity without actually proposing effective solutions to tackle the issue. Recently, the UN and a few NGOs have been dedicated to bringing solutions to artisanal gold miners, but the outcomes remain modest, given the funds expended and the considerable effort invested by interventionists. This commentary paper critiques some of the interventions observed in the last four decades and suggests some technical strategies to approach artisanal miners to reduce mercury losses. It is stressed that mercury elimination is a consequence of good engagement with miners that creates opportunities to show them how to produce more gold with cleaner methods. We recommend that academics educate a new generation of engineers working with AGM to adopt a more practical approach, ensuring they understand the needs, motivations, and skills of artisanal miners before proposing solutions.