A Mimic Model Approach for Impact Assessment of Mining Activities on Sustainable Development Indicators

Mining activities are usually associated with negative outcomes. Therefore, it is crucial to identify and assess these outcomes by the mining company to achieve proper management. The present study has been defined to discover the outcomes of mining activities and their testing in one of the open pit mines of Iran. The present research has been defined into two sections, qualitative and quantitative. The corresponding data of the qualitative section were derived through analysis of the hidden contents of semi-structured interviews with experts and a review of the literature using the Maxqda 2022 software in the forms of open coding and axial coding. In the quantitative section of the study, data were collected via the standard questionnaire and analyzed using the SPSS26 and Mplus software. By coding the interviews and existing documents, 62 primary codes were extracted and classified into 5 main criteria (environmental, health, social, economic, and cultural) in the form of axial coding. The analysis results of the collected questionnaires showed that mining activities had the highest impact on the environment (86.32) and individual health (80.86), while the lower impact was on their economic situation (54.55). The findings of this study showed that there is a significant difference between men and women in terms of the environmental (p = 0.013) and economic (p = 0.01) indicators. While men believed that the mining activity had caused permanent environmental impacts on their living area, women recognized the mining activities as the cause of economic weakness in their families. Results from the present study could be effective in formulating the controlling strategies for potential negative outcomes of mining and achieving effective sustainable development.