Data Analysis from the Africa Mining Watch Mapathon Results
# Africa Mining Watch — mining detections by administrative area
Where satellite-detected mining sits on the administrative map of West Africa and
the Congo Basin, and how unevenly it is spread.
**Live map:**
codeforafrica.github.io
Published by GitHub Actions on every push to `main` - see
`.github/workflows/deploy.yml`. The Mapbox token
comes from the `MAPBOX_TOKEN` repository secret and is never committed.
Two Earth Index surveys mapped the ground scars left by mining across fourteen
countries. This repository holds the interactive map built from them, the tables
every figure on it comes from, and the pipeline that produced both.
## Headline figures
| | |
|---|---|
| Total detections | **12,874** distinct mining footprints |
| Ground disturbed | **868,110 ha** (8,681 km²) |
| Administrative areas affected | **994 of 3,615** (27.5%) |
| Countries affected | **14 of 14** |
Read `docs/SUMMARY.md` before quoting any of these. It records
the method, the rankings, and four caveats that matter — in particular that a
single dissolved polygon accounts for 20% of all detected area, and that
"detected" is not the same as "mining".
## What is here
```
index.html the map; self-contained apart from the optional satellite layer
data/ the derived tables - every figure on the page
detections_by_admin.csv 994 rows, one per affected administrative area
detections_by_admin.geojson all 3,615 areas with counts, colour-coded
detections_by_country.csv 14 rows
detection_points.csv 12,874 rows, one interior point per footprint
summary.json headline figures, machine-readable
pipeline/ the analysis, re-runnable
docs/ method, caveats, and the design tokens
```
## Sources
| Layer | Source | Licence |
|---|---|---|
| Mining detections | Earth Index, Earth Genome — Congo Basin survey 2026-06-17, West Africa survey 2026-06-24 | see Earth Genome |
| Administr …