Mining, Economic Activity and Remote Sensing: Case studies from Burkina Faso, Ghana, Mali and Tanzania

Mining is a major economic activity in many developing countries particularly in Africa. Mining operations, whether small- or large-scale, have an impact on local communities. Previous research focus on how the gold mining sector in Africa is dependent on policy reforms in order to enable countries to better benefit from the sector, changing environmental conditions or the structure of the economic activities in the areas surrounding mines. Here, we apply a novel analytical framework based on medium resolution satellite data for the period 2001 – 2012 to estimate the economic effects of mining in Ghana, Mali, Burkina Faso and Tanzania. Through the analysis of nighttime lights, agricultural vegetation dynamics and forest change, we find a positive effect on average economic growth for most mining districts in Mali, Burkina Faso and Tanzania. Moreover, our analysis establishes strong relationship between statistics of agricultural production and vegetation index from satellite data on district level in Mali, Ghana and Tanzania.