UMT researchers spent a week in Busia documenting the entry of women into formal roles at Wagagai Mining and its supplier chain. The picture is more encouraging than the sector's macro numbers alone suggest.
Women interviewed had moved from unregulated panning on the fringes of licensed concessions into positions in laboratory support, catering, security screening and, in a handful of cases, refinery-floor operations. Wages are paid to bank or mobile-money accounts, hours are recorded, and access to on-the-job training is - at least in principle - open.
Structural barriers remain, particularly around childcare and shift patterns. But the trajectory matters: formalisation is not only lifting standards for men who were already earning; it is quietly opening a door for women who were previously locked out of the mineral economy altogether.