The Diamond Development Initiative (DDI) is pleased to announce a major new partnership with PROMINES, a project funded by the World Bank and the British Department for International Development (DFID) in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) for improved governance in the mining sector

The DDI project aims to assist the DRC government in formalizing the artisanal mining sector, reinforcing its management capacity and establishing a foundation for the social and economic development of artisanal mining communities. Specifically, this program will launch a sustainable process of regular registration and re-registration of artisanal miners. It will organize miners into associations and offer them support in technical areas, entrepreneurship, and pilot development projects to improve the economic and social situation of their communities. The project will be carried in the provinces of Maniema, South Kivu and Province Orientale for artisanal miners involved in gold, tin, tantalum and tungsten mining.

DDI is a unique partnership, bringing together civil society organizations, governments and industry to tackle the very substantial problems of artisanal diamond diggers in developing countries

As explained by Dorothée Gizenga, DDI's Executive Director: "The new project in DRC takes us beyond diamonds because we and our partners feel that our knowledge and success in that field can now be applied to other minerals." In 2011 and 2012, DDI successfully registered over 101,000 diamond artisanal miners in the Kasai provinces, an accomplishment of unprecedented size and importance. In 2013, DDI completed the registration of over 11,300 gold artisanal miners in the Gold Tracking Project, piloted by Partnership Africa Canada.

"The present project in the DRC takes formalization beyond basic registration and introduces programs that will sustain the transformation of the artisanal sector from informal to formal," said Michel Gratton, DDI's newly appointed Program Director.