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Artisanal and small scale independent gold mining activities are a prominent feature in under developed, resource rich nations. Largely, the activities of those with limited access to employment opportunities or educational systems, small scale gold miners pursue a sustainable livelihood through the crude exploitation of the resources prevalent in and around their communities.
Their current ore processing options include: on-site gold recovery with mercury amalgamation; crude, inefficient and expensive small scale grinding and cyanide leaching, or trucking at the miner’s expense to the processing facilities in Southern Peru.
Due to the gold miners’ dependency on natural resources to secure their livelihood, many international or large scale exploration and development efforts have met fierce resistance from these communities.
