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Pact to assess occupational health & safety conditions, training needs of artisanal miners in Indonesia

November 22, 2016
Landscape of a tin mine in Indonesia.

The IDH Tin Working Group has commissioned Pact, an international nonprofit headquartered in Washington, D.C., to assess the occupational health and safety risks for unconventional (artisanal & small-scale) miners in Indonesia’s tin mines of Bangka Belitung province. The situational analysis, conducted in collaboration with local organization Telapak, will contribute to the design of a future pilot program to improve the health and wealth of Bangka-Belitung’s tin miners.

Approximately one-third of global tin production comes from Indonesia’s Bangka Belitung province. The production of cassiterite, the mineral that contains tin metal ore, at all scales (industrial to artisanal) is the primary economic driver of the provincial economy. Estimates place 75% of national production in 2015 from artisanal and small-scale mining.

The project will meet with diverse stakeholders in Bangka-Belitung and Jakarta to identify key priority topics for the Indonesian cassiterite sector, such as issues including miner and community health, safety and environmental rehabilitation. This assessment will form the basis of a training curriculum to encourage safer, legal, more efficient and more sustainable mining in the province.

Meetings are completely voluntary and confidential and will be conducted by international mining experts associated with the University of British Columbia and in close collaboration with respected Indonesian experts and organizations.

For more information on the project, please contact the IDH Tin Working Group via its website: https://www.idhsustainabletrade.com/sectors/mining-minerals/ 

About the Tin Working Group of the Sustainable Trade Initiative (IDH) 

IDH is nongovernmental organization, based in the Netherlands, which convenes public and private partners to accelerate and develop sustainable trade. IDH works with leading multinational companies worldwide and is co-funded by the European Governments including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands. IDH has convened members of the Electronic Industry Citizenship Coalition® (EICC®) and Friends of the Earth (FoE) to form the IDH Indonesian Tin Working Group. The group was joined at a later date by the international tin industry association (ITRI). Participating members of the IDH Indonesian Tin Working Group from the electronics industry are Alpha, Arcelor Mittal, Apple, Asus, BlackBerry, Dell, Huawei, HP, LG Electronics, Microsoft, Philips, Samsung, Sony and, Tata Steel. Apart from these active members there are also other downstream users and industries, such as the tinplate industry, that support the efforts of the Tin Working Group.

About Telapak

Telapak is an association of people. Our members come from indigenous people, farmers, fisherman, activists, lecturers, teachers, businessman, and government officers.  Telapak’s vision is to promote justice on natural resources management.  For that, Telapak works to build community-based and sustainable enterprises across Indonesia.