GGDMA’S STAKEHOLDERS
Stakeholders either have a stake, to the extent that they are directly or indirectly impacted by the GGDMA’s work, and/or an interest and power to either directly influence the organisation or affect it by influencing the context in which it operates.
The GGDMA has several categories of stakeholders with varying degrees of importance and influence. Eleven main groups of stakeholders were identified:
- The GGDMA’s membership;
- All gold and diamond producers;
- Workers in the mining industry;
- Actors in the value These include: domestic shops/licensed gold traders that finance small miners and licensed gold exporters who also finance production and purchase gold for export; other investors; diamond exporters; prospection companies; and actors involved in value-‐added activities such as jewellers, goldsmiths, and dentists. Illegal gold exporters are also stakeholders as their actions influence the industry;
- Commodity network actors who play an important role by retailing inputs such as fuel, lubricants, mercury, food, equipment, spares, and ration and providing services in key areas such as transportation, This group also includes sex-‐workers and other purveyors of entertainment in the hinterland as well as knowledge and other professional consulting services;
- Governmental actors responsible for policy, decision making, development, and regulation of the industry and those working in areas that are important to the industry such as health care and infrastructure provision;
- Residents of hinterland areas adjacent to mining operations that depend on mining for a livelihood, or those that live adjacent to mining operations and that have need for clean water and undisturbed fishing and hunting grounds or otherwise have to live with the effects of mining. This group includes mining towns, smaller non-‐indigenous hinterland settlements, and Amerindian villages. It also includes their elected local government bodies;
- Actors that have other competing resource uses such as: Amerindians peoples that own lands or have applied for land title where mineral properties are located; timber producers; inland fisheries businesses and fishermen; and tourist resorts downstream of mining operations;
- Non-‐Governmental actors in Guyana that are engaged in advocacy and promotion of environmental conservation, sustainable resource management, indigenous peoples rights, labour rights, human rights, improved social conditions in mining areas, mining rights, and/or are engaged in various forms of service delivery such as improved health and awareness. This group also includes other membership based business organisations with shared interests in promoting the business sector, such as the Private Sector Commission and media houses that play an influential role in shaping public beliefs and attitudes towards sector, especially as the vast majority of Guyanese and other stakeholders have never seen a gold mine or visited the interior;
- Citizens of Guyana who collectively own the country’s national resources and on whose behalf the Government manages all national property, including mineral lands; and
- International and bilateral donor organisations interested in supporting sustainable development or involved in projects with Guyana that impact the industry, such as the LCDS.
In the subsections that follow, each of these groups are described briefly along with their importance and influence and the findings of interviews conducted with them on: their assessment of the GGDMA; needs, opportunities, and challenges they see for the industry as well as the GGDMA; and their relationship with the organisation.
However, of all the groups listed the first two, members and gold producers, are the most important to the industry and the GGDMA. Therefore, a more detailed stakeholder analysis is presented for these groups of stakeholders than for others.
