Women artisanal miners must be assisted to enable them access the huge resources in the mining sector, speakers at a programme organised by a non-governmental organization, Center for Gender Economics in Africa (CGE Africa), have said.
They made the call at a one-day training workshop and sensitization programme for local women miners in Olorun, Kwara State capital.
The programme was themed “Empowering Women in Mining to Understand Climate Change Impacts and Advocate for Nigeria’s Energy Transition”.
Programme Manager of CGE Africa, Regina Solomon, said the training was to expose the women to the economic opportunities in the sector through empowerment with the necessary information and training.
“These women are the core people working in the sector and having zero knowledge about the situation will not help them because the people at the top will keep making the money while those that do the major work will get little or nothing because they don’t understand and the knowledge to ask right and relevant questions.”
“There are funds available in the budget line and if they can’t get to that understanding, then they need to know that the world has moved from mining gold, coal and limestone to lithium and cobalt used for batteries to power electric vehicles and most of our phones. These are the things that are getting the attention now.
“Enugu used to be the Coal City, but nobody is paying attention to that anymore. How much can people that are still concentrating on coal make? So the narrative has shifted from gold and coal and other minerals to lithium and cobalt among others”, she said.
She added that training is also designed to help deepen the women’s understanding of how climate change affects small-scale mining, and how the ongoing shift towards renewable energy opens new opportunities for women for them.
“This will equip you with practical knowledge and advocacy skills to make your voices stronger in your communities and in decision-making spaces”, she added.
Facilitator of the programme and CEO of Olive Community Development Initiative (OCDI), Mrs Oluwatoni Adeleke, said the workshop will enable the women to learn to speak in one voice, and advocate for their right to get support from the government.
“This will make them become leaders in the energy sector, learn about the new minerals in demand, access resources and reach out to organizations that can help.
“Lithium is in high demand now in the international market with a large deposit in Kwara State. Before, we noticed that these women were still using the old tools and didn’t know the trend. All that will change now”, she said.
