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Kufatilia: a new Incident Monitoring Mechanism for Gold Supply Chains

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 “Today a man was killed in a pit collapse in an artisanal mining site near Numbi.”

Civil society organizations, working to improve living conditions of artisanal and small-scale miners in Eastern DR Congo, regularly receive this kind of text message.

Capture d’écran du système de Suivis des Incidents de l’Or (SIOr)

Since a few weeks, incidents linked to the production, transport and selling of minerals in South-Kivu and Ituri can be reported in a simple, free and anonymous way.  IPIS, in partnership with the Centre d’expertise en Gestion Minière (CEGEMI), launched a new incident monitoring Mechanism for gold supply chains in Eastern DR Congo. Local CSOs can now collect reliable data on incidents linked to Annex II of the OECD due diligence guidelines for responsible supply chains.

Screenshot from the visualization dashboard showing reported incidents by type (mock data)

Anyone who witnessed an incident can now report it to local CSOs by sending “kufatilia” (‘to report’ in Swahili) to 0850291251 from a Congolese line. The system will automatically generate an incident questionnaire that the informant can fill in anonymously in Swahili, French or English.

Carte présentant les incidents rapportés sur le SIOr (les données visualisées ici sont des exemples)

18 partner organizations, all involved  in the mining sector for many years, have been trained in the use of “Kufatilia”.  These organizations have also been granted access to an online-platform (powered by a Canadian company called Ulula) that host the database of incidents. This way, they can work together to verify, monitor and follow-up reported incidents in a transparent, independent and participative way.

Formation à Bukavu des organisations partenaires à l’utilisation du SIOr

In the coming weeks, a public platform will be launched to facilitate access by local authorities and relevant stakeholders to data validated by the project partner organizations.

Training in Bunia conducted by IPIS and CEGEMI on the Incident Monitoring mechanism