14 years ago we visited the Santa Filomena artisanal mining village for the first time, located in the middle south of our country, three hours towards the mountains of the South Pan-American Highway, at approximately 2,700 meters above sea level. Santa Filomena is located in the department of Ayacucho, in the province of Lucanas, district of Sanccos. An area hard hit by the political violence that lashed our country for 20 years between the 80s and 90s and which to this day is in a situation of extreme poverty.

The first thing that caught our attention was the number of boys and girls who worked in artisanal mining activities, from bringing food to their parents, to carrying heavy baskets with mineralized rocks on their backs or swinging on a quimbalete for endless hours.

Our intervention proposal was based on the premise that in order to progressively eradicate the work of children and adolescents in artisanal mining, a process of integral and sustainable development of the community should be carried out. We developed an intense work in which the challenge consisted of eradicating child labor in one of its worst forms and in a context of extreme poverty, influencing the integral development of the town, articulating local efforts, strengthening their organizations and strengthening their self-esteem. .

Our intervention model was designed thinking that the purpose of preventing and removing children from artisanal mining work required focusing actions on strategic and complementary areas of the development of their locality and their families. This approach to the sustainable development of the town was an essential factor in the consolidation of commitments and actions in favor of the eradication of child labor.

We designed a comprehensive strategy that interrelated various economic, sociocultural and political components, which influenced the reproduction of child labor and became obstacles to the achievement of community development.

We identified, with the participation of fathers, mothers, teachers, boys and girls, what were the causes that were at the base of the work of boys and girls. Noting that child labor in artisanal mining was a family job in which children and adolescents were mostly involved in the form of unpaid work.

Among the main causes we identified that despite their drive, artisanal miners were subjected to a vicious cycle of lack of capital and lack of technical assistance to modernize their production processes. Artisanal mining is a survival activity and as such to improve income, all possible labor should be involved, including that of boys and girls. But we also identified that the absence of recreation and care services, as well as the poor quality of education, or the absence of a secondary school, discouraged parents from choosing to educate their children; in the same way, there was a lack of awareness among parents about the risks of mining work for boys and girls; in addition,

In the same way, we identified what was the work in which the boys and girls intervened according to the various stages of the artisanal mining process. In the mining phase, children from 11 to 14 years old participated in drilling, blasting, waste hauling and boys and girls from the age of 6 carried water and food. In the benefit phase, the children's participation in work was from the age of 8 with crushing, grinding (quimbalete), quartering, beating; from the age of 11 the burning of amalgam, or boys and girls aged 5 years and over in the task of pallaqueo with 6 hours or more under the sun and shaking. In the case of boys, as their age increased, their participation in mining tasks in which greater physical strength was required increased;

We implemented six concurrent strategies that addressed the critical aspects identified in the diagnosis. We developed a first productive modernization strategy, implemented progressively, which took into account their productive capacities, as well as their traditional and cultural forms of work organization. A key issue for the withdrawal of children from the mining production process was the creation of conditions that made possible the replacement of their labor by modern production technologies. For example, a first measure for the removal of children who entered the sinkhole and carried shells full of mineralized stones was the implementation of a mechanical winch that consisted of a small motor with a trolley on rails to transport mineral and clearing from the depths of the mine to the surface, a task in which children were occupied by its size. Subsequently, a cyanidation plant was implemented, which not only improved the productivity and profitability of the activity but also reduced environmental impacts by reducing a biodegradable chemical reagent, recovering up to 75% of the gold when previously it was only recovered between 40 and 50 %.

The second strategy developed was to promote the formalization of the 2013 SOTRAMI Mining Workers' Society, with which artisanal miners have their own mining concession, which has allowed them to give stability to their activity, access to better quality services and supplies and to a lower price, which has increased its profitability. Low profitability and low income having been one of the excuses for involving child labor.

A third strategy consisted of improving family income, we organized a program to support the economic entrepreneurship of women, who were trained in productive issues, a market study was carried out to identify profitable business alternatives, also seeking to promote changes in the position and situation of women who were identified as one of the most vulnerable groups. A revolving fund credit program was implemented and small businesses were promoted.

The next strategy implemented referred to the strengthening of education, nutrition and health services. When we arrived at Santa Filomena there were only two multilevel classrooms with a single teacher. Work with parents, teachers and with the children themselves, so that the process to be implemented is appropriate for all these social actors. At first the strengthening of these systems was in charge of CooperAcción with the support of international cooperation, but later it was possible to involve the local, regional and national levels of government.

A fifth strategy was referred to the strengthening of social organizations, increasing their capacities for organizational management and development management, as well as relations and dialogue with other public and private institutions based on their vision and concerted development plan.

A sixth and final strategy implemented consisted of dissemination, awareness and advocacy both at the local level of the village and in the district and provincial municipalities, the ministries of Education, Health and Women and Human Development, as well as local public opinion and national, in order to promote changes in public policies, in concrete practices, as well as in ways of thinking, culture and customs, in order to generate a new common sense for the eradication of child labor.

Today in Santa Filomena there is a company run by its workers, they have a cyanidation plant, there is now not only a primary school but also a secondary school and a medical post. The dream of Santa Filomena has been fulfilled, the population of the population that lived around the mouth has moved to a new housing area, and for 8 years they have been developing a self-management process. And the most important thing of all is that we no longer find boys or girls who work in artisanal mining activities; and when some families arrive with traditional customs, SOTRAMI is in charge of reminding them that neither boys nor girls work there. That they go to school and that they use their free time as boys and girls, playing.

This experience has been replicated at the level of other artisanal mining settlements in the middle south of Peru and also in other Latin American countries. However, this type of effort requires the support of both the government and international cooperation, the support of private companies, so that there are no setbacks in the main issues that allow the prevention and eradication of child labor in our countries.