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People
> Natural Resources research group

Abbi Buxton

Associate (legal tools team), Natural Resources

Abbi Buxton’s expertise is in the large-scale and artisanal and small-scale mining sectors. Her action research and engagement work focuses on increasing local voice and understanding of realities and priorities in global value chains, large-scale land based investments and international policy spaces.
Full biography

Abbi has in-depth knowledge and understanding of sustainable development challenges and processes in the mining sector – primarily in Africa. Her current work includes the looking at the roles and responsibilities of artisanal miners in global value chains, strengthening local voice in policy engagement and influence, re-examining models of mineral governance and market development (including formalisation), exploring competing land uses, and understanding gender relations and roles.

She has extensive experience managing cross-country teams, working with in-country partners, overseeing implementation of in-country dialogues and research, managing stakeholder relations, global network development, and informing national and global processes based on local evidence and research.

Expertise

Informal actors in formal markets; artisanal and small-scale mining; consultation and participation in large-scale mining; mineral governance; mineral and metal value chains.

Before IIED
  • Research analyst for OTF Group in Rwanda. Included work on the development of the Business Process Outsourcing cluster and research into targeted investment opportunities for the Horticulture cluster in Rwanda.
  • Business analyst for an international law firm. Researched and analysed client business strategies, organisational structures and industries for business development.

Education

  • MSc in development management, London School of Economics
  • LLB, University of Nottingham

Current work

Strengthening local voice and examining political economy in the artisanal cobalt mining sector in the Democratic Republic of Congo; re-examining relations between artisanal and large-scale mining; improving environmental and social safeguards in large-scale mining, including approaches to community engagement and rights protections.

Abbi Buxton's picture
Twitter: @abbibuxton

Latest publications

People and nature first: safeguards needed in mining exploration

Tenure rights in large-scale and artisanal mining: Implications of the Tenure Guidelines

Islands of responsibility? Corporate sourcing of artisanal cobalt in the Democratic Republic of Congo

Des îlots de responsabilité ? L'approvisionnement des entreprises en cobalt artisanal en République démocratique du Congo

Informing dialogue on artisanal and small-scale mining in Tanzania. A thematic review of challenges and solutions

Transforming mining through dialogue

View more publications by this author

 

Abbi Buxton's blog posts

Fenced working site in a field. There are workers and cars parked and a mineral exploratoion drilling rig

Mineral exploration goes unchecked as demand escalates

Blog, Feb 2022
Two men carry a tray on the muddy side of a stretch of water, while another man, bending down, sorts through small stones

Mining cobalt better

Blog, Sep 2021
Miners pushing a cart out of a mine near the Bolivian town of Potosi. For centuries this area had the richest silver mines in South America. Today many of the mines are worked by local cooperatives, but conditions are still harsh (Photo Nyall & Maryanne, Creative Commons via Flickr)

Listen and learn: lessons from the small-scale mining sector

Blog, Feb 2015
Ancestral miners rush to find gold and platinum ore at a mine wall opened by medium-scale mining (Photo: Ronald de Hommel)

Informality and formalisation in the artisanal and small-scale mining sector

Blog, Nov 2014
A panel discusses artisanal and small-scale mining at the Mining Indaba in Cape Town (Photo: Abbi Buxton/IIED)

Building bridges between the money and the many in mining

Blog, Feb 2014
A girl studies under the light of a rechargeable solar lamp.

New research series kicks off with look at energy delivery models

Blog, Dec 2012
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