Preferences of Small-Scale Gold Miners related to Formalization: first steps toward sustainable mining supply chains in Colombia

Artisanal and small-scale gold mining employs millions of poor people, globally, yet also significantly degrades the environment. Support from conscientious buyers, based on the information within certifications, could lower environmental impacts and raise incomes, leading miners to be willing to incur costs to participate in sustainable supply chains. As supply-chain certification may require formalization, we explore miners’ motivations for and the barriers to formalization within a choice experiment in two Community Councils in Afro-descendent areas of Colombia’s Pacific Region: Yurumangui, in Valle del Cauca and San Juan, in Choco. Community Councils have collective land rights—which might make them more willing to engage in collective action often required for formalization. We find that, while all miners prefer to leave the status quo, views of miners in the two Councils differed with regard to formalization. Yurumangui expressed more interest overall in the options we offered, perhaps due to past formalization experiences in San Juan. Yurumangui miners were also more willing to form or join an association to formalize, very likely due to positive past outcomes from organization. We find no consistent effect of gender regarding preferences, though prior voluntary restoration correlates with individual miners’ willingness to restore sites, one requisite of formalization. Our results inform interventions to support formalization in small-scale gold mining communities, as we find miners are willing to try formalization but raise issues related to costs that can hinder adoption and in ways that vary with the past legacies of each Council.