WoMin African Gender and Extractives Alliance, in collaboration with Organisation pour le Renforcement des Capacités de Développement (ORCADE), proudly launches its Participatory Action Research (PAR) on the impacts of industrial scale mining on women artisanal miners and farmers in Kalsaka, Burkina Faso. The Kalsaka Participatory Action Research project led by ORCADE...forms part of a wider nine-country WoMin research project which aimed to deepen analysis on the gendered impacts of the extractives industries in Africa. The Burkina Faso research analyzes the specific ways in which both the industrial and artisanal mining industry impacts upon women’s living conditions and social status...Before Amara Mining opened an industrial extraction site in Kalsaka...the majority of its population relied on agriculture and gold panning for their livelihoods. The community’s initial hopes that the mine would generate business and employment, as promised, were rapidly crushed. Fatima, a 30-year-old woman explains, “Amara Mining stole our fields and prevented us from doing gold panning. My husband had to go find work in town and left me with our five children. I don’t know how to feed them anymore”. Indeed, land that was previously used for field cultivation and livestock was expropriated from peasants living on the mine’s perimeter. Gold panners were evicted with landowners complaining about low levels of compensation. The establishment of the Kalsaka industrial mine has been an absolute tragedy for the community causing much socio-economic unrest and increased levels of poverty. Women, who were already significantly vulnerable, are now worse off. The majority of the women are illiterate and most depended on local landowners to access land to grow cereal and vegetables. Surplus produce was sold onto the market, with additional revenue earned through gold panning. The expropriation of lands and the gold panning interdict have left women with no income and purchasing power at a time when the mine caused a surge in the cost of living. This is harshly compounded by the absence of husbands and sons who’ve had to leave their households to seek work elsewhere...While gold extraction has significant impacts on the country’s growth, communities who live by the industrial operations experience no improvements in their lives. In Kalsaka and elsewhere, people have been getting significantly poorer.