How do current and past mining activities affect water security, health, and economic opportunities?
Abstract
- Abstract
- en This paper investigates the effect of mining activities on health care, income and water deprivations in Africa. By combining household data with mining locations, we conducted an econometric analysis to assess the impact of mining on self-reported water security, health, and economic opportunities for 142,838 households. Our study utilizes the presence of active and inactive mines to measure the effects of household exposure to mining activities. We observe that proximity to active mining sites is associated with self-reported improved water security, access to health, and economic opportunities. Instrumental variable estimates support a causal interpretation of our results. Specifically, households located within a 50?km radius of active mines reported a 4% lower probability of lacking clean water. Our findings also reveal that robust local institutions not only enhance water security but also mitigate the negative health impacts associated with mine closures. These results suggest that strengthening local governance can amplify the potential benefits of mining operations. Therefore, we recommend the strengthening of local government institutions to foster the resilience of vulnerable mining communities.
Subjects
People & roles
Origins & context
- Title
- How do current and past mining activities affect water security, health, and economic opportunities?
- Publication type
- Article
- Language
- English
- Year
- 2025
- volume
- 47
- issue
- 2
- Page start
- 586
- Page end
- 601
- Status
- Peer reviewed
- Relation
- Open Access Publizieren
Identifiers & sources
- ISSN
- 2040-5804
Full text
- Full text
- F E A T U R E D A R T I C L E How do current and past mining activities affect water security, health, and economic opportunities? Raymond Boadi Frempong1 | David Stadelmann2 | Djiby Racine Thiam3 1European School of Political and Social Sciences (ESPOL), Université Catholique de Lille, Lille, France 2University of Bayreuth, Bayreuth, Germany 3Water and Production Economics Unit, School of Economics, University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa Correspondence David Stadelmann, University of Bayreuth, Bayreuth, Germany. Email: david.stadelmann@uni-bayreuth. de. Funding information Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation), Grant/Award Number: EXC 2052/ 1 - 390713894 Editor in charge: Gopinath Munisamy [Correction added on 14 April 2025, after first online publication: The article classification has been updated in this version.] Abstract This paper investigates the effect of mining activities on health care, income and water deprivations in Africa. By combining household data with mining locations, we conducted an econometric analysis to assess the impact of mining on self-reported water security, health, and economic opportunities for 142,838 house- holds. Our study utilizes the presence of active and inactive mines to measure the effects of household exposure to mining activities. We observe that proxim- ity to active mining sites is associated with self-reported improved water security, access to health, and eco- nomic opportunities. Instrumental variable estimates support a causal interpretation of our results. Specifi- cally, households located within a 50 km radius of active mines reported a 4% lower probability of lacking clean water. Our findings also reveal that robust local institutions not only enhance water security but also mitigate the negative health impacts associated with mine closures. These results suggest that strengthening Received: 21 March 2024 Accepted: 26 December 2024 DOI: 10.1002/aepp.13510 This is an open… Read the full text about 7,985 words
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