ASM risk is becoming harder to manage: satellite monitoring lens for mine teams
Reviewed by Joe Ashwell
First reported on MINING.com
30 Second Briefing
Artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) is now a routine, material risk for majors such as Gold Fields, AngloGold Ashanti and Southern Copper, which has had to halt drilling and geotechnical, hydrogeological and environmental studies at Los Chancas in Peru until illegal mining stops. Swissaid estimates at least 435 tonnes of undeclared African gold worth about US$31 billion left the continent in 2022, while a 2025 global inventory links 5.4 million hectares of deforestation to mining, 70% from sites under 1 km². New radar-based and optical satellite change-detection workflows, such as EarthDaily’s monitoring of cloud-obscured ASM in Peru and Ghana, are presented as critical to distinguish isolated incursions from expanding patterns and to target formalisation, enforcement and concession protection.
Technical Brief
- Southern Copper has paused resource drilling plus environmental, hydrogeological and geotechnical campaigns at Los Chancas due to illegal mining encroachment.
- Gold Fields’ SEC filings flag ASM at Ghana, Peru and South Africa assets as a security, HSE and liability exposure.
- AngloGold Ashanti’s annual reports explicitly categorise ASM as a potential source of business disruption and safety risk.
- EITI estimates over 40 million people depend on ASM, complicating enforcement-only safety responses and resettlement decisions.
- In Burkina Faso, illicit flows from five minerals totalled US$4.93 billion (2012–2021), undermining funding for formal oversight and inspection systems.
- UNEP attributes 37% of global mercury emissions to artisanal and small-scale gold mining, driving chronic exposure risks along waterways and food chains.
- MAAP mapped 139,169 ha of gold-mining deforestation in Peru’s Amazon by mid‑2025, prompting calls to tighten ASM law and clean up the REINFO informal registry.
- In eastern DRC, M23 reportedly earns ~US$300,000/month from taxing Rubaya coltan, linking ASM sites directly to armed-group control and security threats for operators.
Our Take
Gold Fields appears frequently in our recent coverage on high-tech, capital-intensive gold operations (for example Salares Norte and Gruyere fleet upgrades), underscoring how listed producers are being scrutinised on ASM exposure at the same time as they push deeper into automation and large-scale projects.
The Swissaid‑cited export gaps for gold from Ghana and wider Africa sit against a backdrop of several hundred gold‑price and producer‑strategy pieces in our database, suggesting that sustained high prices are likely to keep incentivising informal flows even as formal operators like AngloGold Ashanti and Southern Copper tighten ESG controls.
Prepared by collating external sources, AI-assisted tools, and Geomechanics.io’s proprietary mining database, then reviewed for technical accuracy & edited by our geotechnical team.
Related Articles
Related Industries & Products
Mining
Geotechnical software solutions for mining operations including CMRR analysis, hydrogeological testing, and data management.
CMRR-io
Streamline coal mine roof stability assessments with our cloud-based CMRR software featuring automated calculations, multi-scenario analysis, and collaborative workflows.
HYDROGEO-io
Comprehensive hydrogeological testing platform for managing, analysing, and reporting on packer tests, lugeon values, and hydraulic conductivity assessments.
GEODB-io
Centralised geotechnical data management solution for storing, accessing, and analysing all your site investigation and material testing data.