A youth mentorship milestone with science diplomacy

In the last quarter of 2024, qualified youth who are also IBD mentees familiar with Migori County, young graduates from Kenyan universities and colleges, had a chance to participate in thorough field research across the expansive Kenyan district, renowned for gold mining. The research was commissioned by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom (Germany). Following reviews of the technical report, the resulting policy paper was launched in Nairobi on 11th April 2025. This study scored a key milestone of the year 2024, meeting the goal of ensuring that IBD mentees are equipped with the research skills necessary for sustainable competitiveness in this era of knowledge- and technology-led influence. This milestone will be reported at the upcoming “IBD at Five” Inaugural IBD Youth Forum, to be held in Nairobi on 26th April 2025.

IBD Research Assistants

Acknowledged here are the Research Assistants (RAs) who participated in the field data collection exercise, young graduates and qualified statisticians, engineers, and social scientists: Beda Ogola, Billford Otieno, Hilary Otieno, Christopher Odhiambo, Wilson Kibe, Ken Ochieng, Elector Omamo, Jackline Orwa, Collins Ogola, Risper Odhiambo, Milcah Mwacharo, and Isaac Odoyo. They were purposively selected from the pool of IBD mentees to reflect local content (priority given to graduates from the region) while also caring for the face of Kenya (hence additional mentees from the rest of Kenya). 

Study Background

A recent groundbreaking study commissioned and published by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom Sub-Saharan Africa now reveals fresh insights into the slow-moving public health crisis that the use of mercury in extracting gold in Migori, Kenya, is exacting on the artisanal miners, especially women. Conducted in the last quarter of 2024, this study actively involved the miners and other key stakeholders in the gold mining value chain. The lead and author of the study is a seasoned researcher, lecturer in mining at Taita Taveta University, and trained policy analyst. The study also engaged mining and public health professionals, trained research assistants, and certified laboratory services.

The result was a policy paper titled “The toxic tools, a poisoned ecosystem and the gender toll”. The policy paper was launched in Nairobi on 11th April 2025 in full glare of the media and a diversity of mining sector stakeholders. The policy paper is distributed freely by the publisher, the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom Sub-Saharan Africa, which will also provide a download link for wider availability.

Synopsis of the Research Findings

What is New in the New Study?

This new study was fundamentally different in the following three main ways:

1. Breaking away from decades of fragmented, few and far-between studies on the health, environment and socioeconomic issues affecting the gold mining sector in Kenya, this is a comprehensive modern-day study exploring the policy-science-society nexus and using GIS technology for precise spatial metrics, complete with digital data capture tools to expose a slow-moving public health crisis and gendered disparities. The study involved more than 480 respondents from all the gold mining hotspots of Migori County.
2. For the first time in Kenya, a comprehensive, scientific and spatially zoned approach with weighted means was used to estimate the population participating directly in artisanal and small-scale gold mining (ASGM) in Migori County, Kenya (158,000). This step closed the long-standing gap in providing reliable estimates and updating statistics for well-informed planning, strategy, and policy design.
3. To provide solid scientific evidence of compliance with WHO standards for mercury contamination, the study collected and tested 28 samples drawn from the water sources, agricultural soil, tailings, and fish in and around the gold mining areas.

Summary of findings

Based on a scientific approach involving 481 interviews, GIS analysis, stakeholder consultative meetings (FGDs), and laboratory tests of water, soil, tailing, and fish samples, this policy paper reveals fresh findings using evidence-based and data-driven facts on mercury’s toll on the artisanal miners in Migori County, Kenya.

Besides being pushed to the margins of the mining business ownership and decision-making space, women bear the brunt of mercury hazards and wage inequality. Yet, they are the majority participating in the washing of the ores using mercury and the heating of the gold-mercury amalgam. However, the women earn wages that are half of, and in some cases, five times below what their male counterparts are entitled to. Child labour was confirmed in the gold mining business, and more than half of the artisanal miners fell in the 18-34 age bracket, with a median age of 26.

That more than 70% of the artisanal miners attained only primary-level education (42%) or no formal education (29%) paints the portrait of a mining business that is depriving the communities of opportunities for formal education, calling for urgent policy interventions and alternative sources of economic empowerment that can encourage and complement continuing educational accomplishments.

From the GIS analysis results, the exactitude needed for parametric policy advice was evident. For example, the communities should not use water from any sources within a buffer zone of 100 m from the gold mining hotspots for cooking or drinking, as the samples were confirmed to contain mercury 50-100 times above the WHO safe limit of 0.001 mg/L for drinking water. Similarly, the soils within 400 m of the gold mining sites were found to contain mercury exceeding the safe limit recommended by the WHO of 0.05 mg/kg, hence unfit for growing crops.

Recommendations

1. Law enforcement and compliance monitoring should use these findings to secure the health and safety of miners and local communities.

2. Key long-term solutions should target sensitisation and adoption of mercury-free mining technologies and practices within the ASGM sector to reduce mercury contamination risks. Gravity separation and concentration methods, and environmentally friendlier substitutes for mercury, are ready alternatives.

3. Efforts must be directed at formalisation strategies and tailored training of the miners, diversification of economic empowerment opportunities, and provision of innovative and fit-for-purpose protective gear without gender discrimination.