Fixing Zimbabwe's Gold Mining Sector (Online Event, 10th Dec 2020)
Channel: International Crisis Group
Date: 2020-12-11

Scenes of gang violence have multiplied in Zimbabwe’s gold mining sector over the past years, costing hundreds of lives. While the media and government blame the booming industry of artisanal mining, it is clear that Zimbabwe’s flawed centralised gold buying scheme, patronage-based economy and obsolete regulatory system have played a major role in the escalation of the violence. Significantly, the growing instability has now eroded export revenue when it is most needed by President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s government to keep the country’s struggling economy afloat.

On Thursday, 10 December, our Africa Program Deputy Director, Dino Mahtani, and his guests, Piers Pigou, Crisis Group’s Senior Consultant for Southern Africa, Mukasiri Sibanda, Tax and Natural Resource Governance Advisor at Tax Justice Network Africa, and Anouk Rigterink, Former Economics of Conflicts Fellow and Associate Professor at the University of Durham, discussed the need for reforms and development in the Zimbabwean mining industry during an online conference entitled “Violence, Patronage and Dwindling Exports – Fixing Zimbabwe’s Gold Mining Sector”.

This online event followed the publication of a report entitled All That Glitters is Not Gold: Turmoil in Zimbabwe’s Mining Sector, which is available in full in English on our website. In it, we argue that the government and mining companies, as well as civil society and international actors, can all take progressive measures to prevent these violent outbursts, which are strongly destabilising one of the country’s leading industries.

https://www.crisisgroup.org/africa/southern-africa/zimbabwe/294-all-glitters-not-gold-turmoil-zimbabwes-mining-sector

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