Mining habitat, house and home during an East African gold boom: economic and emotional dimensions

ABSTRACT

This article interrogates migrants’ economic and emotionally entwined decision-making regarding migration and settlement in unfolding stages of a gold mining boom. Three Tanzanian gold mining settlements representing temporal, spatial and scalar differences along the gold mining trajectory are contrasted: an artisanal rush site, a mature artisanal mining settlement and Geita town, site of a large industrial gold mine. Our data derives from in-depth interviews with miners, traders, service providers and farmers supplemented by a household survey. Interviewees’ verbatim narratives describing their work and family life are laced with feelings of both anticipation and apprehension. Strategic calculations and contingency thinking combine with emotional anxiety as they pursue efforts to ‘get ahead’ during the mining boom. Amidst the uncertainty of stressful work lives, and obstacles to secure housing and residence in infrastructurally deficient, unsafe and polluted mining environments, a ‘deferred sense of home’ surfaces in many mining settlement residents’ narratives. Seeking a ‘comfortable and secure home eventually’ is a coping mechanism for bridging the gap between initial high expectations and their current material reality.

KEYWORDS:

• Migration
• artisanal mining
• large-scale mining
• housing
• settlement
• emotion
• Tanzania

Acknowledgements

Thanks go to Crispin Kinabo for his collaboration, the key informants and surveyed miners and residents of the three mining settlements for their willingness to participate in this study, and Clare Oxby for her perceptive comments on the draft paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Bryceson, “Deagrarianization and Depeasantization,” 368–377.

2 Bryceson, et al., Mining and Social Transformation; Bryceson and Mackinnon, “Eureka and Beyond,” 513–527.

3 Hayes, Artisanal and Small-scale Mining.

4 Bryceson, et al., “Unearthing Treasure,” 631–649.

5 Damasio, Strange Order of Things.

6 Ibid., 12.

7 Ibid., 189.

8 Allen, Home, 8.

9 Hill, Gold Rush; Ell, Gold Rush; Gray, Gold Diggers.

10 Kulindwa et al., Mining for Sustainable Development.

11 Chachage, “Meek Inherit the Earth,” 37–108; Bryceson and Jønsson, “Gold Digging Careers,” 379–392.

12 Bryceson and Mwaipopo, “Rural-Urban Transitions,” 158–174.

13 Jønsson and Bryceson, “Rushing for Gold,” 249–279.

14 Bryceson and Jønsson. “Gold Digging Careers,” 379–392.

15 Bryceson, Jønsson, and Verbrugge, “Partnership or Prostitution,” 33–56.

16 Fisher, “Occupying the Margins,” 735–760.

17 T.K., 34-year-old male used clothes salesman, primary school education. Interviewed 6 July 2011.

18 Bryceson, Jønsson, and Verbrugge, “Partnership or Prostitution,” 33–56.

19 Bryceson, Jønsson, and Sheridan, “Miners’ Magic,” 353–382.

20 Jønsson and Bryceson, “Rushing for Gold,” 249–279.

21 US$=TSh 1275, as of January 2012. (www.w-rates.com. Accessed 1 July 2021).

22 K.M., 72-year-old male local farmer. Interviewed 6 September 2011

23 J.J., 34-year-old itinerant artisanal gold rush miner/farmer, normally resident on a farm in distant rural Kagera, married with two wives and three children. Interviewed 4 September 2011.

24 T.J. 35-year old restaurant owner from the regional capital Mwanza city, lower secondary education. Interviewed 4 September 2011.

25 J.L., 52-year-old pharmacist. Interviewed 4 September 2011.

26 Focus group of four miners from Katoro: A.J. 35 years, Sukuma, born in Bariadi, mined since 1996 at nine locations; K.M., 60 years, born in Geita, mined since 1972 at 13 locations; M.J. 29 years, Sukuma, born in Bariadi, mined since 2003 at 8 locations; J.J. 34 years, Sukuma, born in Bariadi, living in Chato, mined since 1997 at 8 locations. Interviewed 4 September 2011.

27 Secretary of the Mwanza Regional Miners Association (MWAREMA) headquartered in Nyarugusu. Interviewed 8 September 2011.

28 Lemelle, Capital, State and Labor.

29 G.M., 30-year-old Chagga GGM employee, born in Arusha. Interviewed 3 August 2011.

30 F.K., 26-year-old Chagga businessman. Interviewed 3 September 2011.

31 S.E.S. 29 years old unmarried Chagga hardware shopkeeper born in Geita with secondary school education and a diploma in project planning and management. Interviewed 8 September 2011.

32 D.K. a 37-year-old Sukuma born in nearby Misungwi District, married with one wife and three children. Interviewed 3 September 2011.

33 S.S.T., 24-year-old married male artisanal miner, born in Geita region, primary school educated. Interviewed 10 July 2011.

34 E.M., 50-year-old local artisanal miner-cum-gold buyer, primary school education with wife, 3 children and 4 grandchildren. Interviewed 10 July 2011.

35 R.N.M., 47-year-old Magistrate Court clerk from Kigoma. Interviewed 13 July, 2011.

36 Jønsson and Bryceson, “Beyond the Mining Site,” 2–23.

37 Melber, Rise of Africa’s Middle Class; Mercer and Lemanski, “African Middle Classes,” 429–438.

38 Lahiri-Dutt, Between the Plough and Pick.

39 Bryceson, “Artisanal Gold Rush Mining,” 31–61.

40 This gold boom primarily involved the in situ Kuria population rather than large numbers of migrants. “[T]the gold boom in Nyamongo did not benefit the rest of the economy, not only because the area developed as an enclave society, but also because the gold sector in Nyamongo developed as an underground economy with little linkages to the national economy’ Chimhete, “Prosperity,” 573. See also Chimhete, Gold Mining.

41 Damasio, Strange Order of Things.

Additional information

Funding

We are grateful for the support of the University of Glasgow and Department for International Development UK (DfID) and the Economic and Social Research Council funding (ESRC RES-167-25-0488).