French Guyana’s “Golden Mountain”: job creation at the expense of the environment?
A huge gold extraction project may be launched by
a consortium of Russian and Canadian companies in French Guyana by 2019. Although
it could create hundreds of jobs, local associations and inhabitants are standing
against the project, denouncing its environmental impact.
Creating jobs to fight unemployment
Guyana hopes to
reconcile jobs and the environment. Indeed, the “Golden Mountain” project is
one of the largest foreign industrial projects ever in the French overseas territories.
The two companies, “Nordgold” from Russia and “Columbus Gold” from Canada, hope
to earn 2 billion euros from the gold they will
extract, and the overall economic benefits of the project are estimated at 1
billion euros.
The consortium has
announced the creation of 900 direct jobs, followed by 650 more when production
begins. In the end “Golden Mountain” should generate 3000 indirect jobs. Ultimately
90% of the positions should be held by locals, a golden opportunity in a region
where the per capita income is half the French national average. On France
Télévision Guyane, President Emmanuel Macron said, “I think it is a project which,
fundamentally speaking, could be good for Guyana”, although he also called on
the companies to respect certain “requirements and constraints” concerning
environmental criteria and local employment.
An environmental threat
But despite the
commitment of the two companies to “mine responsibly”, inhabitants and local
associations are sceptical. Indeed, the technical study includes plans to excavate
a 2.5-kilometer-long pit located between two wildlife
reserves using high explosives. Opponents denounce the impact of the use of
57,000 tonnes of dynamite, and potential damage to the hydrological network if an industrial disaster occurs.
The National
Consultative Commission for Human Rights (NCCHR) also warned the
government that “during the exploitation of Golden Mountain, millions of
cubic meters of mud will have to be extracted, treated using cyanide to extract
the gold, and then stored”. Cyanide
is of course highly toxic, and the companies intend to contain the contaminated
mud in dikes. But Guyana’s capricious weather and frequent heavy rains could
break the dikes. Other NGOs point out that numerous gold mine catastrophes have
occurred in the past, freeing contaminated mud or water. If the dikes were to
break, Guyana could be facing an unprecedented ecological disaster.
Accordingly, the
French government has decided to organize a four-month-long public debate in
Guyana in March 2018 to decide if the project, which could begin by the end of
2018, is convincing enough. President Macron has assured the press that “no decisions will be made until the end of
the public debate”.
Victoria Gravure
Sources
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