Livelihood Decision Making and Environmental Degradation: Small-Scale Gold Mining in the Suriname Amazon

Abstract

This study examines why mining booms occur and why some people participate in them while others, living in comparable conditions, do not. Ethnographic data were collected among the Ndjuka Maroons, forest peoples in the Suriname Amazon. The occupational justifications of 41 gold miners and 34 nonminers generated a decision-tree model with a 95.5% prediction rate. The results suggest that decisions about mining are rational given the present economic conditions of both Ndjuka households and of Suriname as a whole. The author argues that environmental awareness campaigns and stricter law enforcement are not likely to encourage more sustainable resource use in Suriname, and probably not in other parts of the Amazon rainforest. Rather, more effective conservation policy would be to promote people-centered development in rural regions through improved public education and health care, while stabilizing national economies.