North Mara Gold Mine is a combined

open pit Open-pit mining, also known as open-cast or open-cut mining and in larger contexts mega-mining, is a surface mining technique of extracting rock or minerals from the earth from an open-air pit, sometimes known as a borrow. This form of minin ...

and underground

gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile me ...

mine Mine, mines, miners or mining may refer to: Extraction or digging * Miner, a person engaged in mining or digging *Mining, extraction of mineral resources from the ground through a mine Grammar *Mine, a first-person English possessive pronoun ...

in the

Tarime District Tarime District is one of the seven districts of the Mara Region of Tanzania, East Africa. It was previously known as the "North Mara District". Its district capital is Tarime town. It is bordered from the north to east by the Kenyan districts o ...

of the

Mara Region Mara Region (''Mkoa wa Mara'' in Swahili) is one of Tanzania's 31 administrative regions. The region covers an area of . The region is comparable in size to the combined land area of the nation state of El Salvador. for El Salvador at The neigh ...

Tanzania Tanzania (; ), officially the United Republic of Tanzania ( sw, Jamhuri ya Muungano wa Tanzania), is a country in East Africa within the African Great Lakes region. It borders Uganda to the north; Kenya to the northeast; Comoro Islands ...

. It is one of three gold mines of Acacia Mining plc, a company listed on the London Stock Exchange, that operates in Tanzania, the other two being Bulyanhulu and the

Buzwagi Gold Mine Buzwagi Gold Mine is an open pit gold mine in the Shinyanga Region of Tanzania, located 6 kilometres southeast from the town of Kahama. It is operated by Acacia Mining. It is one of three gold mines Acacia Mining operates in Tanzania, the othe ...

. The mine has been controversial in the local community, with an attack on the mine in 2008. Though parts of the government and the operating company deny it, a 2016 study counted at least 20 local deaths and nearly 1000 cattle.

History

Gold mining in Tanzania in modern times dates back to the

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) ** Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ge ...

colonial period, beginning with gold discoveries near Lake Victoria in 1894. The first gold mine in what was then

Tanganyika Tanganyika may refer to: Places * Tanganyika Territory (1916–1961), a former British territory which preceded the sovereign state * Tanganyika (1961–1964), a sovereign state, comprising the mainland part of present-day Tanzania * Tanzania Main ...

, the Sekenke Mine, began operation in 1909, and gold mining in Tanzania experienced a boom between 1930 and

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

. By 1967, gold production in the country had dropped to insignificance but was revived in the mid-1970s, when the gold price rose once more. In the late 1990s, foreign mining companies started investing in the exploration and development of gold deposits in Tanzania, leading to the opening of a number of new mines. The North Mara mine, which opened in 2002, consists of one active open pit (Nyabirama) and one active underground mine (Gokona), a process plant, waste rock dumps, a tailings containment pond, and other associated facilities. As of 2014 there was an expected mine life of 9 years remaining. The mine was owned by ''Afrika Mashariki Gold Mines'', which became ''Placer Dome Tanzania'', a subsidiary of

Placer Dome Placer Dome Inc. was a large mining company specializing in gold and other precious metals, with corporate headquarters in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. In August 2005, the company had interests in 16 gold mining operations in 7 countrie ...

. Barrick Gold took over Placer Dome in January 2006.

2008 attack

In 2008 a group of 200 people broke into the North Mara mine site and destroyed approximately

US$ The United States dollar (symbol: $; code: USD; also abbreviated US$ or U.S. Dollar, to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies; referred to as the dollar, U.S. dollar, American dollar, or colloquially buck) is the official ...

15 million worth of Barrick property, including setting some of it on fire. The vandalism resulted in temporarily closing an open pit, and an increase in security on the property. Motivation for the attack on the property was not determined, the local police suggested they were attempting to get gold from the pit.

Environment

In 2009 a Tanzanian Member of Parliament, Harrison Mwakyembe, demanded the Mara Gold Mine be closed, due to the deaths of eighteen villagers from Nyamongo which had been attributed to drinking water polluted by the mine. In February 2010 the

National Assembly of Tanzania The National Assembly of Tanzania ( sw, Bunge la Tanzania) and the President of Tanzania of the United Republic make up the Parliament of Tanzania. The current Speaker of the National Assembly is Tulia Ackson, who presides over a unicameral as ...

ordered the government to have a study completed to determine if the North Mara Gold Mine was polluting the Tigithe River (the drinking water supply for more than 250,000 people), thereby killing people and livestock, as had been reported. The government accepted the "principle" of doing the study, and stated that there had been minimal environmental monitoring done in the area because the National Environment Management Council is quite small, with only 20 environmental inspectors for the entire country. In June 2010 the Tanzanian government declared the Tigithe River free of pollution, following changes made to Barrick's environmental program. The government stated the water is potable and suitable for human consumption. Barrick had replaced of liner within their effluent pond, which they claim was destroyed by vandalism. A 2016 study concluded that the mine regularly and repeatedly violated human rights protections for the

Right to a healthy environment The right to a healthy environment or the right to a sustainable and healthy environment is a human right advocated by human rights organizations and environmental organizations to protect the ecological systems that provide human health. The rig ...

in Tanzania.

Killings at the mine

In 2011 and 2013 several villagers who entered the mine area looking for gold were killed by police officers assigned to support the mine's security guards. The court case brought against the mining company by Humans Rights Organizations on behalf of families was settled out of court in February 2015.

References

External links

African Barrick Gold website

''Secretariat of the

African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States The Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States (OACPS) is a group of countries in Africa, the Caribbean, and the Pacific that was created by the Georgetown Agreement in 1975. Formerly known as African, Caribbean and Pacific Group o ...

website'' {{Barrick Gold Barrick Gold Gold mines in Tanzania Surface mines in Tanzania Buildings and structures in the Mara Region 2002 establishments in Tanzania