Why gender matters - Centre for Social Responsibility in Mining ...

How to – Know and understand
1.0 Know and understand
Knowing and understanding the community is essential to your team’s efforts
to build positive community and stakeholder relationships and to having an
effective communities programme.
This takes time, but an important
first step, embodied in the
Rio Tinto Communities standard,
is developing accurate community
profiles and continuously
deepening understanding of
local communities. This is as
critical for operating businesses,
as it is for projects about to enter
production, projects still in the
evaluation phase and projects
dealing with closure.
While it may be too difficult
to detect all significant gender
related issues within a community
at an early study stage, it is
important that early consultation
with women and men is
undertaken, as this may reveal
some issues for later research.
From the very outset, we should
seek to build our knowledge
and understanding of:
– gender roles and responsibilities;
– differences in women’s and
men’s access to and control
of resources;
– women’s and men’s practical
and strategic gender needs 5 ; and
– the potential for Rio Tinto’s
activities to impact any of the
above, positively or negatively.
Rigorous data collection
and analysis in the baseline
community assessment (BCA)
should enable the Communities
and Project Management
teams to further understand
any gender related social and
economic issues, roles, and
relationships. These aspects may
pose difficulties or important
challenges to relationship
building and benefit sharing with
local communities. Collecting
gender disaggregated data from
the outset is essential to achieve
these goals. Case study 6 on
the Argyle Diamond operation
illustrates what can happen when
women’s groups are ignored
(page 46). In contrast, case study
4 about Rio Tinto’s exploration
project in India highlights efforts
to build bridges with women in
order to obtain their views, which
the project then responded to
(page 40).
Checklist
[ √ ] Have you included information
about men and women, boys
and girls in social baseline,
impact and risk assessments?
[ √ ] Have you held consultation(s)
with women and men
(including separate groups, as
appropriate)?
[ √ ] Have you broken down socioeconomic
and organisational
data by gender?
[ √ ] Have gender and diversity
impacts been considered for
different stages of mine life
including closure?
[ √ ] Have barriers and constraints to
participation along gender lines
been identified?
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5. Practical needs are those that help people (usually
women) in their existing subordinate position in society
and strategic needs are those that help transform existing
subordinate relationships (Moser, 1993).