By Mashe Umaru Gwamna
The Renevlyn Development Initiative (RDI) has trained female Journalists on extractive reporting.
The training, hosted virtual focused on equipping women journalists with critical tools to report more robustly on gender-specific issues in the extractive sector.
Speaking in her presentation titled : ‘Missed opportunities reporting women in artisanal mining’, a Media Strategist, Vanessa Adie, said very often, reports about women in artisanal mining do not look at issues beyond environmental degradation, high and low mining seasons.
She said there are missed opportunities in the narratives about reporting women in artisanal mining.
Adie outlined some missing opportunities in women reporting which include; women lack of access to land and mining licenses, as well as their exclusion from key points in the mining process.
She stressed on how the financial earnings of this women are been controlled,
“The remit it to their husbands, guidance , parents and others.
“There is hardly any room for growth in the hierarchy or expansion of their business as a result and their inability to invest in machinery that would ease their work.
“Woman are not given opportunities beyond carrying sand in the mining site.We Don’t really ask what of type land do these women work upon”,She said .
She further explained that women are exposed to long time health hazard such as
chemical exposures,back pains, arthritis , effect on maternal and reproductive health and among many others effects .
The Media Strategist added that women in the artisanal mining go through Sexual exploitation, physical violence and death.
