By Marcena Hunter

Exploitation and criminal capture of the ASGM sector is multifaceted and complex.

The development potential of the African artisanal and small-scale gold mining (ASGM) sector is undermined by criminal consortia across the continent who exploit it for economic and political ends at the expense of vulnerable populations. Yet, much of the discourse around ASGM in Africa has not directly addressed criminality, instead being framed within development or conflict frameworks. In an effort to fill this gap, this report seeks to unpack how criminal consortia manipulate ASGM and associated gold flows to secure illicit rents and capture the sector. The findings highlight the need for nuance, especially regarding the role of informal and traditional actors in the sector. Through a more holistic understanding of the challenge, policymakers will better be able to identify and combat criminal consortia in ASGM.

ENACT - Africa, 2019. 44p.

By Fawzi Banao, Bertrand Laporte

The actions of terrorist groups destabilize border states and economies. The presence of mining activities, such as gold extraction, favors the illicit export of this ore to finance terrorist groups. Using COMTRADE data, we estimate gold customs fraud with mirror analysis (gold export missing) for 50 African countries between 2000 and 2019. We use ordinary least squares, two-stage least squares, generalized method of moments, and local impulse strategy in our empirical strategies to estimate the impact of terrorism on gold customs fraud. Our results suggest that states affected by terrorism must pay more attention to the trafficking of gold, as this is a valued mineral for terrorist groups. The response to conflict with terrorist groups cannot be solely military. The State must necessarily get the various state services to work together, particularly the army, the police, and customs. The institutionalization of this cooperation remains a real challenge for these states. Regarding customs administration efficiency, data analysis is at the core of customs modernization programs. Only internal and external trade data have been used in risk management systems. Cooperation with the armed forces must allow the acquisition of tools and skills to analyze other data sources, such as satellite data. Customs could then carry out all of its missions at the borders: collecting duties and taxes but also protecting the local/border economy and cutting off the funding sources for terrorist groups.

Clermont-Ferrand, France Centre d’Études et de Recherches sur le Développement International, 2022. 27p.

By Roman Grynberg, Jacob Nyambe & Fwasa Singogo

The article reviews recent research and controversies surrounding the quantification of illicit financial flows (IFF) in the gold mining sector in Africa. It is argued that the methodology and data used in the quantification of the most frequently analysed technique, i.e., export undervaluation, is flawed not only because of the recognized weakness of the international trade data, but also because it focuses only on one aspect of IFF, and does not attempt to address issues pertaining to actual under measurement or misspecification of volumes. It is argued that estimates of tax evasion activities can only be determined through forensic economic and accounting techniques, and not through macro-economic or trade data. The last section considers the increased evidence of gold smuggling to the UAE from various African countries, some of which produce no gold of any significance, but appear to export in very large volumes; and at unit import values well below world market prices.

Tanzanian Economic Review, Vol. 9 No. 1, 2019: 35–59

By United States. Federal Emergency Management Agency; United States. National Oceanic And Atmospheric Administration

From the document: "Climate change has resulted in verified impacts to populations, infrastructure, and the economy across the nation. The acceleration of climate change will increase the frequency and intensity of natural disasters and thereby increase the probability of climate-related threats. By anticipating increased response and recovery demands generated by more extreme and frequent disasters, emergency managers can devise ways to manage the impacts from changing climate patterns. This guidance is intended to provide FEMA national and regional planners with an overview of changes to the risk profiles of climate-related hazards for every region so that they may conduct appropriate response and recovery planning activities. Adapting risk profiles for established hazards requires guidance on how to find and incorporate climate information. Most FEMA deliberate plans are developed for the national and regional levels. Typically, these plans are based on short-term assumptions about future conditions using observed data on meteorological conditions. While historical data are essential, they are no longer sufficient given the reality of climate change. Using a defined timeframe and operational area, emergency management planners can define climate-related risks and validate anticipated impacts by accessing authoritative climate resources."

United States. Federal Emergency Management Agency; United States. National Oceanic And Atmospheric Administration . 2023. 59p.

By Prem Mahadevan

India’s socio-economic realities have evolved significantly over the past four decades, particularly as far as attitudes to wealth accumulation are concerned. Gold is today no longer negatively associated with crooked businessmen, but rather positively with the consumerist aspirations of middle-class India. It is used to project enhanced family status at events such as the ‘great Indian wedding’, and is perceived as a high-return investment and a hedge against inflation. Demand for gold has consistently risen 14% annually since 2001, with prices altogether increasing eight-fold. The Indian love affair with gold continues even as the economy strains under the weight of gold imports that degrade the fiscal balance. Gold is metaphorically to many Indians what opium was to the Chinese in the 19th century: an addictive escape from institutional decay and social stagnation. But hoarding gold pits the individual and their family against the government and its need to keep liquidity flowing in order to grow the economy.

Geneva: Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime. 2020. 49p.

y Fawzi Banao, Bertrand Laporte

The actions of terrorist groups destabilize border states and economies. The presence of mining activities, such as gold extraction, favors the illicit export of this ore to finance terrorist groups. Using COMTRADE data, we estimate gold customs fraud with mirror analysis (gold export missing) for 50 African countries between 2000 and 2019. We use ordinary least squares, two-stage least squares, generalized method of moments, and local impulse strategy in our empirical strategies to estimate the impact of terrorism on gold customs fraud. Our results suggest that states affected by terrorism must pay more attention to the trafficking of gold, as this is a valued mineral for terrorist groups. The response to conflict with terrorist groups cannot be solely military. The State must necessarily get the various state services to work together, particularly the army, the police, and customs. The institutionalization of this cooperation remains a real challenge for these states. Regarding customs administration efficiency, data analysis is at the core of customs modernization programs. Only internal and external trade data have been used in risk management systems. Cooperation with the armed forces must allow the acquisition of tools and skills to analyze other data sources, such as satellite data. Customs could then carry out all of its missions at the borders: collecting duties and taxes but also protecting the local/border economy and cutting off the funding sources for terrorist groups.

Clermont-Ferrand, France Centre d’Études et de Recherches sur le Développement International, 2022. 27p.

By Roman Grynberg, Jacob Nyambe & Fwasa Singogo

The article reviews recent research and controversies surrounding the quantification of illicit financial flows (IFF) in the gold mining sector in Africa. It is argued that the methodology and data used in the quantification of the most frequently analysed technique, i.e., export undervaluation, is flawed not only because of the recognized weakness of the international trade data, but also because it focuses only on one aspect of IFF, and does not attempt to address issues pertaining to actual under measurement or misspecification of volumes. It is argued that estimates of tax evasion activities can only be determined through forensic economic and accounting techniques, and not through macro-economic or trade data. The last section considers the increased evidence of gold smuggling to the UAE from various African countries, some of which produce no gold of any significance, but appear to export in very large volumes; and at unit import values well below world market prices.

Tanzanian Economic Review, Vol. 9 No. 1, 2019: 35–59

By INTERPOL

All countries in the region have imported civil explosives and initiators, increasing the risks of diversion. In Central African countries, explosive substances, explosive precursor chemicals and initiators are controlled products and special authorization is needed to import, use, and transport or store them. However, some of these products are diverted, and used to manufacture improvised explosive devices (IEDs), or in activities such as illegal mining or blast fishing. Criminal actors are involved in the illicit flows of explosives. Some are the illegal final users of explosives, which constitute the last step of the illicit supply chain. These are the non-state armed groups (NSAGs) using explosives as weapons, such as Boko Haram and, its rival offshoot, the Islamic State in West Africa (ISWA) in the Lake Chad Basin (Chad and Cameroon), the separatist NSAGs active in the North West and South West regions in Cameroon, the Retour, Réclamation et Rehabilitation (3R) NSAG in the Central African Republic (CAR) and the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) active in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Other actors include illegal mining sector players, Illegal dealers, thieves and smugglers.

ENACT-Africa, 2023. 47p.

By Prem Mahadevan

India has seen a tripling of demand for sand from 2000 to 2017, creating a market worth 150 billion rupees, or just over two billion US dollars. The country has the third-largest construction industry in the world, following those of China and the United States, accounting for 9 per cent of its two-trillion-dollar economy and employing more than 35 million people. Given the dizzying rate of India’s construction boom, guesstimates indicate a massive shortage of licitly mined sand.

This paper looks at patterns of sand mining in India and the impact that it may have on governance, security, the environment and the growth of entrenched criminal networks. The conclusions suggest that civil administration is retreating before a mafia-like nexus of political, business and bureaucratic interests, which connive to flout judicial orders. The secondary and tertiary effects of such activity bode ill for societal stability, even though a certain amount of (tenuous and often exploitative) employment is generated by illicit sand mining. The paper also highlights a policy conundrum: can India, which, paradoxically, combines widespread economic backwardness with sky-high consumer aspirations, find a model of environmentally sustainable development? Or is it doomed to exacerbate the harshness of already abysmal living standards experienced by its rural population (who make up two-thirds of its population) to satisfy the needs of its urban middle class?

Geneva: Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime 2019. 27p.

By Eric Scheye

Using country specific formulae in three categories – water and electrical utilities, tax administration and land management – this paper presents an empirical methodology to measure state actors' political will to reduce organised crime.

A lack of political will is often used as an excuse by policymakers, donors and development practitioners to explain failures in policies and programmes. While this is true for most development programming, it is particularly salient with regard to anti-corruption, the rule of law, and efforts to combat organised crime. Indeed, political will is vital if governments are to reduce the deleterious activities of organised crime; without it, crime proliferates. Using country specific formulae in three categories, water and electrical utilities, tax administration and land management, this paper presents an empirical methodology to measure the political will possessed by state actors to reduce organised crime.

ENACT-Africa, 2020. 20p.

By Edward Wanyonyi and Lucia Bird

As the development of communications infrastructure accelerates, good governance and security are often sacrificed in the interest of a speedy rollout.

While Africa’s growing communications infrastructure and increasing internet penetration offer significant developmental benefits, they offer parallel opportunities to organised crime, which exploit the continent’s enhanced connectivity. These opportunities are set to grow with nascent research already indicating that the continent is an increasingly important source of both cyber-dependent and cyber-enabled crime. It is a crucial and already tardy moment to take stock of how these vulnerabilities manifest, and how they can best be addressed. If they remain ignored and unmitigated, organised crime will increasingly undermine progress and development, compromising the achievement of the very goals that enhanced infrastructure seeks to achieve.

ENACT-Africa, 2021. 20p.

By Mark Shaw

Foreign criminals are a significant presence in Africa. Four typologies of foreign criminal actors are identified, allowing an exploration into why some actors develop more successful criminal enterprises than others. Success appears to be the result of a slow embedment in the local criminal economy, avoiding displays of wealth and the targeted corruption of officials. It also depends on the expansion of ethnic networks where high levels of trust or coercion of members prevent law enforcement penetration. Eroding these successful criminal operations requires an ability to disrupt recruitment into the networks and ultimately their more effective integration into legitimate economic activities.

ENACT-Africa, 2028. 24p.

By Mohamed Daghar

Kenya faces a scourge of illegal and unregulated sand mining, a crime which is leaving irreversible scars on ecosystems, lives and livelihoods. Sand mining has been driving inter-communal conflict and has ushered in a violent cartel market protected and controlled by state actors. Weak legislation, ineffective controls and an insatiable demand for sand, fuelled mainly by the construction industry, all contribute to the problem. With lack of a formidable alternative, sand remains the only option for mass concrete production. But it must be harvested sustainably and not mined – as promising practices in communities suggest. Key findings • The sand trade is driven by organised criminal cartels that enjoy protection from powerful state actors. • Communities play a crucial role in ensuring sustainable sand harvesting, which can provide long-term employment opportunities and help to reduce job scarcity for Kenya’s youth. • Sand mining in Kenya is fuelling environmental degradation, affecting livelihoods and increasing inter-communal conflict. • A lack of strong regulations and sufficiently mandated authorities means that there is no effective framework to oversee sand activities. • Properly regulated sand harvesting and trading could generate much-needed revenue for local governments.

ENACT-Africa, 2022. 24p.

By Olwethu Majola and Darren Brookbanks

This paper uses data and analysis to assess the UNTOC's effectiveness in addressing transnational organised crime on the continent. The international community prescribed the United Nations Convention Against Transnational Organised Crime (UNTOC) as the treatment to slow the global spread of TOC. However, current diagnoses suggest that this has not been as effective as anticipated. This paper assesses the efficacy of the UNTOC and recommends some changes to the treatment that are likely to yield more successful results.

ENACT-Africa, 2023. 32p,

By HM Government (UK)

The publication of the Rape Review in 2021 demonstrated a commitment to improving the Criminal Justice System process for victims, and to more than double the number of adult rape cases reaching court by the end of Parliament. Now, two years after its publication, we are making strong progress towards the Rape Review’s ambition to return volumes of cases being referred by the police to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS); charged by the CPS; and going to court, to at least 2016 levels. The data shows us that 2016 marked a key point in time where the system faltered: well-documented issues regarding the disclosure of evidence combined with strained relationships between criminal justice agencies, inconsistent support for victims, and ultimately a decline in the number of charges and prosecutions for rape cases. We have made clear our intention to continue reversing these trends. Having delivered on the vast majority of milestones set out by our Action Plan’s eight levers, we are pleased to report that we have already met two of our ambitions and remain well on-track to meet the one that remains, with a strong upward trajectory. Whilst we know that there is much more to do, this shows that our Action Plan is working.

London: HM Government, 2023. 40p.

By Julia Coxen

Sex trafficking is a heinous criminal act that compels victims in the United States and worldwide to perform commercial sex acts through force, fraud, coercion, or age (TVPA, 2000). This dissertation takes a risk-analysis and data-driven approach to attain a better understanding of the problem, with the goal of showing that such an approach can help comprehend misallocation of resources, reform policy, reinforce social services, or support populations vulnerable to sex trafficking. Sex trafficking is a complex problem and must be studied both qualitatively and quantitatively in order to provide those in a position of influence with an improved basis for decision-making. In Chapter 2 of this dissertation, I outline the risks associated with sex trafficking and suggest that risk analysis tools can be useful for anti-trafficking efforts, as they can provide context-sensitive, empirical knowledge as well as a way to communicate neutrally about a charged topic. Building on the understanding of this complex crime, in Chapter 3 I analyze online commercial sex work advertisements to draw conclusions about the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on sex trafficking, showing a measurable impact of the pandemic-related stay-at-home orders on advertising, and likely on the vulnerability of at-risk populations to trafficking. Finally, in Chapter 4 I use data collected by myself and a collaborator on sex work advertisements as a basis to explore three quantitative methods for detecting anomalies in time-series data. Based on the results of this sex trafficking case study, I evaluate the benefits and drawbacks of each method for risk-based decision-makers and discuss how these methods can be integrated into a broader risk framework.

This dissertation contributes to the field of sex trafficking research by offering improved methods for detecting anomalous behaviors in the system and advancing the application of these techniques for the risk analysis community. Although they are specifically designed for sex trafficking, analysts can apply these methods to many of the risk-related challenges of our future.

Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, 2021. 147p.

By Samantha K. Brooks, Sonny S. Patel·and Neil Greenberg

The COVID-19 pandemic profoundly affected physical, mental, and economic well-being across the globe and has disproportionately affected certain vulnerable groups. This paper provides a scoping review of literature on the impact of the COVID19 pandemic on sex workers, published between December 2019 and December 2022. Six databases were systematically searched, identifying 1009 citations; 63 studies were included in the review. Thematic analysis revealed eight main themes: financial issues; exposure to harm; alternate ways of working; COVID-19 knowledge, protective behaviors, fear, and risk; well-being, mental health, and coping; access to support; access to health care; and the impact of COVID-19 on research with sex workers. COVID-associated restrictions led to reduced work and income, leaving many sex workers struggling to cover basic needs; additionally, government protections excluded those working in the informal economy. Fearing the loss of their already reduced number of clients, many felt compelled to compromise both prices and protective measures. Although some engaged in online sex work, this raised concerns about visibility and was impossible for those without technological access or skills. Many feared COVID-19, but felt pressure to continue working, often with clients who refused to wear masks or share exposure history. Other negative impacts on well-being related to the pandemic included reduced access to financial support or health care. Marginalized populations (and especially those in professions which require close contact like sex workers) need further support and capacity-building within the community to recover from the impact of COVID-19.

Archives of Sexual Behavior (2023) 52:1969–2010

By Lila Abed

o contribute to a reduction and, ultimately, the eradication of femicide in Mexico, the Wilson Center’s Mexico Institute launched its “Engendering Safety: Addressing Femicide in Mexico” Initiative in 2022 to bring together key stakeholders to raise awareness, explore the driving factors and enabling environment, and outline action items for both government and civil society. Since the launch of the initiative, the Mexico Institute has organized a series of events and consultations to help inform a report to the Mexican Senate on the policy options available to Mexico’s legislature to effect positive change for women’s safety.

In October 2022, the Mexico Institute, in partnership with the Mexican Senate’s Special Commission to Investigate Cases of Femicide of Girls and Adolescents, organized a National Forum titled Femicide: Visions and Solutions. During the one-day session, more than two dozen federal and state-level public officials, lawmakers, civil society organizations, activists, experts, and academics discussed preventive measures, best practices, and legislative actions that can reduce and eradicate femicide in Mexico. The data and research shared has informed the drafting and introduction by Mexican lawmakers of several legislative proposals.

This report is a compilation of the data, best practices, preventive measures, and public policy recommendations presented during the National Forum. The objective of this report is to summarize the findings of the conference in an effort to raise awareness and so that Mexican lawmakers can utilize this information when drafting and approving bills to prevent, reduce, and eliminate femicide and gender-based violence in Mexico.

Washington, DC: Wilson Center, Mexico Institute, 2023. 64p.

By Grahame Allen, Zoe Mansfield

This briefing paper looks at homicide statistics for England and Wales. It also covers equivalent statistics for Scotland and Northern Ireland, and other international comparisons. The paper examines statistics on the characteristics of victims and offenders, the methods used to kill and the outcomes for offenders.

London: House of Commons Library, 2023. 40p.

By Pathfinders for Peaceful, Just and Inclusive Societies,

Most countries have actually experienced sustained declines in homicidal violence across several decades. Notwithstanding the disruptive effects of COVID-19 and associated economic stresses in 2020, these trends are expected to continue in several parts of the world. For most people, the world is a much safer place than it was at the beginning of the twenty-first century. This does not guarantee that the future will be more secure, but it does suggest whatever the causes, progress has been made.

A new report from Pathfinders – Future Trends in Homicide – finds that these positive trends could be undermined within the next decade unless more investment in violence prevention is undertaken. Specifically, the total number of homicides could rise by 28 percent over the next ten years – three times the expected rate of global population growth with increases most acute in the Americas and Africa. The cumulative total homicide count would reach 4.3 million by 2030. Similar trends are also evident in relation to terrorist killings, with increases across all regions especially Africa and Asia.

New York: Center on International Cooperation, 2020. 28p