The Mining Affected Communities United in Action (Macua) social movement builds grassroot structures that are empowered to understand the climate crisis facing their communities and society at large. The issue of climate change is integrally linked to democracy. Along with the Women Affected by Mining United in Action movement, Macua campaigns for the right of people harmed by destructive extractive industries to have the right to say no to developments on their land. Macua helps to strengthen the agency of mining-affected communities so that they can hold those in positions of power to account and to amplify their voices at a national level given that they are not represented in statutory and regulatory bodies that make decisions on their behalf. The movement has an extensive footprint in rural areas, and understands that it is mostly women who carry the burden of the immediate and long-term effects of both fossil fuels extraction and energy production. The link between nature and society manifests through the ways in which the minerals and energy sector has historically shaped (and continues to shape) the politics and economics in South Africa. Mining and extractive industries produce greenhouse gases and associated chemicals that cause severe environmental problems, including climate change, that directly affect people’s livelihoods, safety and health. Macua works to lay a foundation to catalyse a genuine just transition. It argues that a corporate-biased, profit-oriented renewable energy system involves land dispossession and exclusion and will continue to do so if the climate crisis is not approached in a holistic manner.
What’s been your/the organisation’s greatest achievement in your field?
Our greatest achievement is the way MACUA is building the agency of marginalised and excluded communities so that the importance of global priorities and local realities are recognised. Decisions taken at the local level have a significant contribution to make towards the resolution of global crises. By the same token decisions that are taken at a global level often have severe consequences at the local level.
As a national movement, MACUA and Women Affected by Mining United in Action (WAMUA) have understood that mining-affected communities, who are mainly in rural and peri-urban areas and living next to some of the most ecologically harmful industries, are at the coal face of the most severe climate impacts. As such the movement highlights and informs the community and helps build their agency to advance their interests.
Please provide specific examples of how your/your organisation’s practices and work have a positive effect on the environment
MACUA has built more than 80 branches across the country and each branch includes a WAMUA group. Some branches also include youth groups who operate under the banner of Youth Affected by Mining United in Action. Through them people are empowered to understand the climate crisis. These structures are supported to undertake social audits and community health surveys to understand the effect that climate change has on their daily lives, and to support them to take action at the local and national level to drive sustainable transitions to a more environmentally and socially just economic model.
MACUA runs a National School Debate programme that Involves learners from marginalised communities in discussing practical solutions that address the challenges they face.
It also undertakes social audits and health surveys in communities with a view to empowering them to take action against corporate actors who violate people’s rights to a healthy environment.
What are some of the biggest environmental challenges faced by South Africans today?
Besides the obvious and urgent need to tackle the fossil fuel emissions at national and global levels, there is an urgent need to empower local communities who are affected by industries and corporations that pollute the environment and the land, to be able to participate in the debates which are currently being shaped by elite actors, which includes corporate, state and civil society elites. To date all the consultation processes have been dominated by these elite actors who occupy an enormous amount of space in the discourse around climate change and suggest that the outcomes from such elite centric processes will ultimately only benefit the elites of society.
As mining affected communities who have been dispossessed of our land, our heritage, our health and our clean environments, we know better than most, that if you are not seated at the table when negotiations are held more likely to continue to bear the brunt of the impacts of climate change. So from the standpoint of the marginalised and excluded, the priority is to ensure that whatever solutions are agreed to, the effect will not be apportioned to the poor and marginalised while the elites walk away with the profits.
Our theme this year is Celebrating Environment Heroes. What do you believe could be the repercussions for millions of people in South Africa and the continent if we do not tackle problems exacerbated by climate change, encompassing issues like drought, floods, fires, extreme heat, biodiversity loss, and pollution of air and water?
The world is affected by global warming and pollution. Historically marginalised communities often face the worst consequences of climate change, which affects our health, ability to grow food, housing, safety and work. People living in developing countries are particularly vulnerable. Sea-level rise and saltwater intrusion have advanced to the point where whole communities have had to relocate, and protracted droughts are putting people at risk of famine. The number of climate refugees is expected to rise.
Explicit and implicit social norms and laws have imposed differentiated powers, roles, and responsibilities on women and men in all aspects of life. Girls and women — especially those living in the global south — bear an unequal responsibility for securing food, water, energy, and other vital resources as well as for caring for young and older people — which places them at greater risk of experiencing detrimental climate impacts. In addition, they are prevented from full and fair participation in the global climate action movement. They continue to face gender-specific violence and harassment as a result of their climate activism, remain underrepresented in global climate negotiations, and their solutions are under-resourced.
Women in rural and peri-urban areas, where MACUA and WAMUA organise, play key roles as food producers and caregivers. Many depend on natural resources for their livelihoods.
In places where mining and extractive industries produce greenhouse gases and associated chemicals that cause severe environmental problems, women often bear an unequal share of social, economic, and environmental risks.
Contamination of farmland destroys their livelihoods and forces many women into transactional sex work; mining communities tend to have higher numbers of sex workers. Mining pollution also threatens women’s reproductive health, resulting in higher rates of miscarriage and children born with abnormalities.
Rural women’s health and livelihoods, which are directly affected by the quality of their environment, are important entry points for grassroots organisations to help communities understand women’s rights and the effect of environmental degradation, including climate change, has on their lives.
These areas also present rich opportunities for women’s participation in decision-making processes related to health and economic livelihoods.