Early Stage Researcher: Beatrice Gibertini

Research Directors: Prof. Dr. Rémi Bazillier (Centre d’Economie de la Sorbonne University Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne, Centre National de Recherche Scientifique); Prof. Dr. Marjo de Theije (Faculty of Social Sciences, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam)

Specified Project Title: Mining, Women and Poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa

Objectives:
The first objective is to explore the effects of artisanal mining on living standards and poverty. Using geo-localized data on households, the goal is to provide solid evidence of the effects of such activities on living standards and poverty at the local level. The second objective is to focus on Corporate Social Responsibility of industrial mining. The analysis requires the evaluation of different CSR policies of large mining firms and the exploration of the local effects based on geo-localized household data sets. A legal analysis will be conducted, focusing on working conditions and the legal framework applying to different mining companies. The empirical analysis would be focused on Burkina Faso, Ghana and South Africa.

Expected Results:
Quantitative effects of artisanal mining on local households. Impact of CSR policies and local effects of industrial mining on households. Legal study on working conditions in the mining industry.

Secondments:
The project involves a strong collaboration between the Centre National de Recherche Scientifique/ Centre d’Economie de la Sorbonne at UP1 and VU Amsterdam and includes mandatory research stays of the ESR in Amsterdam for six months in total.
Further secondments are planned at the Centre for Research on Multinational Corporations (SOMO), Netherlands (3 months) and as field research periods in Africa (3 months), supervised by the University of Cape Town (South Africa).

Publications:

Bazillier, Rémi and Gibertini, Beatrice and Jackson, Stephen (2023), 'Gold and Diamond Artisanal Mining in Liberia: Under the Umbrella of In(Formality)?', Resources Policy, 86 (Part B), 104287.

Benshaul-Tolonen, Anja and Gibertini, Beatrice and Konte, Maty (2024), African Mining Economies and the Gender Gap in Political Participation, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4756923 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4756923.

Gibertini, Beatrice (2025), The hustle lifeways of Black women in mining-affected communities of South Africa, The Extractive Industries and Society, 22, pp. 101629.

Conferences:

June 2024: 2024 Conference of the Development Studies Association (DSA) at SOAS, University of London.

June 2024: 2024 Africa Meeting of the Econometric Society in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire.

March 2024: 2024 CSAE Conference at the University of Oxford, UK.

November 2023: Development Dialogue (DD19), International Institute of Social Studies (ISS), The Hague.