Participation of Emgrisa in the final Workshop of the project “Minamata Initial Assessment” for Western African countries

Emgrisa participated in the workshop at the end of the project – Minamata Initial Assessment – for Western African countries, which took place in Dakar (Senegal) between the 12^th and 14^th of December 2017. Its main objective was to share experiences and lessons learned in the early stages of the implementation of the Minamata Convention on the protection of human health and the environment from the adverse effects of mercury.

The workshop was organized by the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), being another agency such as the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) responsible for implementing the project with assistance from the World Health Organization (WHO).

Participants at the workshop were representatives and technicians, mostly belonging to the Ministry of the Environment of Senegal, Niger, Togo, Burkina Faso, Guinea, Benin and Mali, which worked by pooling the realities, experiences, needs and priorities of individual countries in the issue of mercury.

Emgrisa, invited by UNITAR, was present with the participation of Raúl López Márquez, Senior Environmental Consultant and Head of Business Development of Emgrisa, who undertook many technical presentations during the workshop about the particularities of the research projects of sites contaminated with mercury, as well as the Best Available Technologies, BATs for the remediation of this metal in soil and water. These presentations as well as sharing experiences on completed projects, focussed on countries where the Artisanal Small-scale Gold Mining (ASGM) is common where mercury is used in amalgam for the separation and extraction of gold.

With our participation, Emgrisa reinforces its collaboration with the United Nations, not only in the development of projects for their agencies, but also with a commitment to share and disseminate our experiences in unconventional pollutants such as mercury and its various compounds.