Remote Sensing in support of ASGM policy development

Project description

This project is being settled in the frame of a wider study that aims to support: (1) national and regional artisanal and small-scale mining (ASGM) policy development and evaluation; (2) environmental risk assessment in aquatic environments affected by ASGM activity; (3) the further development of the guidance for national action plans (NAPs) on ASGM; and (4) the monitoring guidance work advanced by the Secretariat of the Minamata Convention for the effectiveness evaluation. The project contributes to the development of a technical background-document on the influence ASGM activity has on the aquatic environment, and on the benefits and challenges in using remote sensing technologies and in-situ environmental monitoring of mercury in water, sediment and selected biota, individually and together. The project also suggests a strategy and methods for ASGM site-identification and prioritization, as well as environmental sampling, chemical analysis and data-treatment in support of the study's objectives. The role of the GRID-Geneva team in this project is fourfold: contribute to the drafting of the technical-background document; implement remote sensing methods to illustrate the technical guidance document with concrete use cases; develop a story map into MapX in order to showcase the results of the use cases; and coordinate with a Ghanaian researcher to get a regional or national perspective on the study.