Small-scale salt miners hail Cepa project

Small-scale salt miners in group village head Chavirakale in Paramount Chief Lundu in Chikwawa have commended a project Cepa is implementing for training them in disaster risk and environmental management, among other things.

They said this last week on the sidelines of a media tour Centre for Environmental Policy and Advocacy (Cepa) organised to appreciate the impact the Sustainable Mining for Applied Livelihood Enhancement (Samala) for Youth and Women Project is making among small-scale miners in the area.

Nchalo Salt Mining Cooperative secretary Maliko Gamulanje said since Cepa launched the project in the area in 2020, they have acquired vital skills such as environmental management and disaster risk management.

“Before Cepa launched the project, we were doing things ignorantly. This resulted in rampant environmental degradation.

“But now we are involved in afforestation, especially replanting jacaranda trees which do well here unlike other tree species. This helps to conserve the environment,” he said.  

Another member of the cooperative, Linda Kutama Dausi said the Cepa project has improved their livelihoods because they now benefit more from the venture than before.

“I call upon other organisations to come in to complement what Cepa is already doing here, especially by helping us find markets for our salt.

“Most customers demand more than three tonnes of salt at once. We need better and modern equipment to be able to meet such demand

“Cepa has taught us a lot, including the need to form a cooperative and village savings and loans groups which will go a long way in improving our livelihoods,” she said. 

However, Dausi bemoaned floods which hit the area annually, saying they sometimes work in vain as their salt gets washed away by floods. She said in March this year, the cooperative lost 44 50-kilogramme bags of salt when Tropical Cyclone Freddy hit the Southern Region. 

Cepa project officer Charles Kabambe said, among other things, his organisation also constructed a building at the mining site for the cooperative to process and mine the salt.

He said: “What is remaing now is to train them in marketing  and salt processing to help them get certified by Malawi Bureau of Standards because their main aim is for their salt to penetrate the Malawian market.”

Cepa is also implementing the project among small-scale gold miners in T/A Phalula in Balaka.