About

This web site aims at communicating the methods, results, conclusions and recommendations from a Master’s thesis “Land Cover Change detection: A Case Study of Chingola, Zambia”, submitted to the University of Helsinki in 2011 by Paul Eliphas Zulu.

Mining brings to the environment a number of hazards which in turn lead to reduction of forest cover, erosion of soil and pollution. In terms of its negative impact, open-pit mining is more destructive to the environment than underground mining because it involves clearing of the land at the mining site. The environmental damage that has occurred in Chingola due to mining is irreversible and alarming.

Chingola is burdened by an economic and environmental paradox. On the one hand development and growth of the mining industry is crucial in addressing Zambia’s social and economic plight; on the other hand it is destroying the local environment.  Mining companies have done irreparable damage to the landscape and cannot help having further negative and irreversible impacts on the environment. Despite the fact that mining industry provides jobs to both foreign and local people, its consequences and immediate impacts on the ecosystem should be adequately addressed. People should be aware of the anguish suffered due to mining mishaps that can never be quantified. The main question for the Zambians today is not whether mining will come with sustainable development, but whether in the long term there will be enough endowment for a life with prosperity and dignity for the next generation to come. This is a serious question and requires a serious answer. Despite growing awareness of environmental protection in mining areas, mining will forever be a key contributor to environmental degradation. Inexplicably and inexcusably, recommendations by the Environmental Council of Zambia, a body mandated to monitor the environment in Zambia, never includes and certainly never stresses mining as the major contributor to the diminishing of the Miomba woodland cover. In the end, the mining companies, the Environmental Council of Zambia, the government and the people of Zambia should all recognize the obligation to protect the Miomba woodland not only in Chingola but in the whole country. It is with this background in mind that this study was realised.