Illegal Gold Mining Gutting Madagascar's Flagship Park; Officials Enforcing Enviromental Laws Killed

[hatrack]

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Over the last two years, small crews of miners using rudimentary hand tools have made repeated incursions into Ranomafana, located in southeastern Madagascar, to dig hundreds of shallow pit mines in the Soarano wetland. They cleared what was once a continuous canopy of spindly endemic screw pines (genus Pandanus) in the process. The wave of mining coincides with a steadily worsening security situation in the area, as reported by Mongabay in 2017, complicating attempts at enforcement and limiting researchers’ ability to quantify the problem.

In 2017, the mayor of Ambalakindresy, a town just west of Ranomafana, was murdered in what locals believe was retaliation for his cooperation in enforcing environmental laws. A year later, a local police captain investigating gold mining and cattle theft in the area was also shot and killed. Meanwhile locals have had to contend with frequent robberies and carjackings by groups of armed dahalos,the Malagasy term for gangs involved in livestock theft.

The links between gold mining in the park and the broader threat to the rule of law are unclear, said Cabeza, a biologist at the University of Helsinki who has spent more than a decade researching the practice of conservation in southeastern Madagascar. “But if you ask the villagers they keep saying it’s the bandits,” she added.

The paper’s authors used satellite imagery to analyze changes in forest cover and, unable to explore the most affected areas freely on foot, relied on drone photography to survey the wetlands there. They also gathered anecdotal reports suggesting that some locals have abandoned rice cultivation in favor of higher-paying work panning for gold. Cabeza said the difficulty of doing research itself eliminates one potential check on mining inside the national park. “The more we retreat, the more dangerous it becomes,” she said.

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https://news.mongabay.com/2019/02/illegal-gold-mining-destroys-wetland-forest-in-madagascar-park/

[hunter]

1. The gold industry is vile.

Using gold for anything other than utilitarian purposes, especially as some sort of store of "wealth," is unethical.