14th Annual Alternative Mining Indaba
Oxfam and its partners will be attending the 14th annual Alternative Mining Indaba (AMI) in Cape Town from the 7th – 9th of February 2023. The AMI will take place at the University of Cape Town’s Business Graduate Conference Centre under the theme, “A just energy transition: Unlocking Community Potential and Participation.”
Oxfam participants from South Africa, Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia and Zimbabwe Ghana, Senegal, Kenya, and Uganda will be at the AMI.
As the extractive industries and their stakeholders meet for the annual Mining Indaba, Oxfam and it’s partners believe that mining-affected communities, non-state actors, and civil society organisations need to reassert their voices and assert their rights on the impact of the extractive industries on the lives of affected communities.
We are committed to a socially inclusive ‘just energy transition’, which recognises that energy transitions are primarily about people – both those who make decisions and those who are most impacted by them.
The AMI provides an important platform for collaboration between African countries, communities and organizations to ensure that as we transition away from fossil fuels, the transition prioritizes people over profits and addresses African energy poverty and access challenges. In addition, meaningful compensation is provided to communities that are directly and indirectly impacted by mining.
Oxfam around the world works with communities affected by extractives to uphold their rights to free, prior and informed consent (FPIC) when it comes to mining activities, which have had negative environmental, health, social, and economic conditions on their lives and livelihoods for decades.
As the world grapples with climate change, the ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict, the food crisis, growing inequality, increased austerity, and the slow post-Covid-19 recovery, countries in the Global South are hit thehardest and pushed further into poverty.Women, girls, and marginalised people in mining-affected communities carry the burden.
Oxfam South Africa and Southern Africa believe that the extractives sector should be held accountable for adverse effects of mining, that the sector should not be allowed to operate with impunity, and that communities need strategies to ensure they have meaningful participation in the activities undertaken by mining cooperatives in collaboration with governments in their areas.
We support the AMI as an alternative voice for communities and seek to be part of an engaged African citizenry that will use that voice and agency to demand policy reforms, transparency, accountability, and responsive supply chains in the mining sector.
To interview subject specialists from Oxfam who can unpack the just energy transition, climate change and the extractives sector, please contact Gaopalelwe Phalaetsile on +27-72-400-5602 or email: gaopalelwe.phalaetsile@oxfam.org.za
