Articulating, Strengthening and Building Solidarity - Women's Resistance to Mining

Apr 25, 2019 | Global Alliance for Green and Gender Action
View Original

 “Our grandparents told them to provide good roads, (electrical) power and hospitals. 
But they didn’t meet any of these expectations.
Here there is no power. 
Development… we don’t even know what development really is because we can’t feel it.” 
Pascaline*, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)

Throughout the three continents of Africa, Asia, and Latin America, there is no dearth of stories where communities have been forced to leave their lands to make way for government-sanctioned and corporate-driven natural resource extraction. You would not need to look far to find communities in areas where such projects are taking place in the name of development and progress. Communities that are forced to live under increasingly insecure conditions; in which their main source of life and livelihoods, access to communal lands, water, and forests, as well as their safety and security, are threatened by extractive industries and mega-infrastructure projects.