The Social And Environmental Impacts Of Mining Activities On Indigenious Communities
[THE CASE OF NEWMONT GOLD (Gh) LIMITED]

1.4. Methodology in brief

In the conduct of research, there is the need to have a design and in the words of Bryman (2008: 31), “the design provides a framework for the collection and analysis of data”. In essence, the design would influence and determine the choice of the methods to use in the collection of data. Basically, five prominent designs are outlined by Bryman and involve the experimental design, cross-sectional design also known as survey research, longitudinal design, case study and comparative design. For my research, I have employed a case study design because it involves looking at the social and environmental impacts of mining activities in a specific place which is Kenyasi and taking the activities of a mining company (Newmont Gold (Gh) Limited) as a single case to study.

With my research approach, I have employed a more qualitative approach and adopted semi-structured interviews, observation, focus group discussion and analysis of texts and documents related to Newmont activities in the Ghana and Kenyasi in particular as my methods for empirical data collection. My choice of these methods is informed by the fact that “case study designs often favour qualitative methods such as participant observation and interviews” (Bryman, 2008: 53). It also enabled me to generate much needed information and as well as doing an intensive and detailed examination of the case study.

For my interviews, I have conducted face to face semi-structured interviews with fifty (50) household in the Kenyasi community. These households were randomly sampled and selected since it is easy to do so because the community settlement pattern is such that people live in households of about eight (8) to about fifteen (15) and more closely knit and related family members living together in the same house. This was followed by a focus group discussion that consisted of seven (7) people including an opinion leader in the community, three migrants but resident in the community and three other indigenous residents of Kenyasi. An interview was also carried out with one employee from the Communication Department of Newmont Gold (Gh) Limited since they are responsible for documenting and communicating all the day to day activities and initiatives of the company to the public. The official?s information given was significant in communicating to me the activities and initiatives of Newmont Company on matters of compensation, social responsibility, vulnerable programmes, environmental management practices, impact mitigation and community development issues. I should however state that the restrictive and closed nature of Newmont company presented a difficulty in getting the Newmont top officials for the interviews. I therefore had to rely on only one employee from the communications department of the company who pleaded for anonymity and confidentiality in the granting of the interview at a secret place.

1.5. Thesis Outline

This thesis is organized as : Chapter one (1) as presented above involves the introduction to my research topic, the research objectives and research questions, the study area comprising mainly of description of Newmont Gold mining Company and the Kenyasi community and a brief description of my methodology of my research. The second chapter

 covers the literature review and presents literature that is related to my topic of study. Chapter three (3) presents the methodology and the method used in the collection of empirical data. In Chapter four (4), the empirical findings from the research on the field are presented and analyzed in the light of the theoretical frameworks that are outlined in the literature review. In Chapter five (5), conclusions are drawn and some suggestions and recommendations are made.