The Iquira Gold Mine, Colombia

In the green hills of Huila, Colombia, coffee farmers go underground to mine gold – under the Fairmined Standard, every year since 2014. Their cooperative runs the Iquira gold mine, processes its ore without mercury and invests its Fairmined Premium in safer tunnels, homes and care. That is what responsible small-scale gold mining looks like in practice – and Iquira gold went into the Nobel Peace Prize.

Key insights

• Coffee farmers founded the Iquira gold mine. Eleven miners founded the cooperative in 2004; many still alternate between tunnels and coffee.
• Fairmined certified every year since 2014. ARM calls it the longest-running Fairmined certification.
• No mercury, cyanide under control. Iquira phased mercury out with its first Fairmined Premium and processes in closed circuits.
• The Fairmined Premium pays for safety, homes and care. It funds ventilation, rescue training, housing land and therapy for children with disabilities.
• Gold for peace. The first Fairmined Nobel Peace Prize medal came from Iquira in 2015; in 2016, Iquira gold honored Colombia's peace process.

Table of contents

• Iquira at a glance
• From coffee farmers to gold miners
• Gold underground, coffee above
• Inside the Iquira gold mine
  • Underground vein mining
  • The way out of mercury
  • Cyanide, under control
• Why Iquira gold is responsible
  • Audited every year since 2014
  • Protecting water, forests and soil
  • Fair pay and safe work
• Where does the Fairmined Premium go?
• Equal opportunity at Iquira
• Nobel Peace Prize, Olympics and Palme d'Or
  • The first Fairmined Nobel medal
  • Peace for Colombia, gold from Huila
  • Olympic Laurel and Palme d'Or
• Why Iquira is a model for the region
• Iquira gold at Fairever
• FAQs: The Iquira gold mine, Colombia
• Key takeaways
  • In a nutshell ...
  • Get active, be the change!
  • Further reading
• Sources

Iquira at a glance

From coffee farmers to gold miners

For generations, the families around Íquira lived from coffee. Then, around 1999, some of them started following gold-bearing veins into the hills behind their farms.⁶ The early days were rough, as the miner Mercedes Arias Martínez remembers:

"At the beginning we worked using candlelight because there was no electricity." – Mercedes Arias Martínez⁷

In April 2004, eleven miners in Íquira, Colombia, founded the Cooperativa Multiactiva Agrominera del Municipio de Íquira.² "Multiactiva" means its members pursue more than one line of work. It holds a registered mining title and official licenses.⁸

In 2014, the cooperative became the first organization certified under ARM's regional Fairmined project with the Inter-American Development Bank.⁹ That December, it shipped its first export: 1,200 grams of gold.⁶ Its legal representative, José Ignacio Pérez, is clear about why:

"If it had not been for the certification, the Cooperative would not have been able to achieve all that it has achieved." – José Ignacio Pérez¹⁰

Gold underground, coffee above

Fairever's founder, Florian Harkort, knows the cooperative first-hand. He first came in 2018 with ARM, as he tells in Why Fairever Exists. In December 2021, he returned with the Hamburg goldsmith Jan Spille and a crew from the German broadcaster ZDF for the documentary plan b: Gold und Glitzer.¹¹

"Every time I come to Iquira, I'm struck by how the mine entrances hide among the coffee plants. Depending on the season, the same people work as miners or as coffee farmers. To me, that is a textbook example of sustainable development done right: families don't depend on a single income, and the region's economy becomes more diverse." – Florian Harkort, founder of Fairever

This is coffee country. Íquira lies at around 1,400 meters, has 9,248 inhabitants and lives mainly from coffee.¹² Huila is Colombia's leading coffee department, with 19.65 % of the national harvest in 2025.¹³

At the Iquira gold mine, gold is a second income, not a replacement for farming. Many members switch between mines and coffee plots with the seasons;⁸ families also grow bananas, cassava and plantain and keep livestock.⁹⁷ For ARM, Iquira proves that farming and gold mining can coexist:⁹ two incomes instead of one, and mining without mercury.

Inside the Iquira gold mine

Underground vein mining

The Iquira gold mine works underground, along veins in the rock. Miners follow them into the mountain with carefully placed explosives and chisels. In 2014, visiting US jewelers counted 13 active, well-ventilated tunnels, each about 100 meters long.¹⁴

The way out of mercury

The cooperative processes gold without mercury. That matters: artisanal and small-scale gold mining is the world's largest man-made source of mercury, with 37.7 % of global emissions to air.¹⁵ It builds up in fish and people, as our overview of gold mining's environmental impact explains.

At certification in 2014, the cooperative still used mercury, but with retorts and a phase-out plan.¹⁶ It put 60 % of its first Fairmined Premium into its processing plants and cut mercury use by 80 %.¹⁷ By September 2015, it was down to 5 %.⁶ According to ARM, it stopped entirely before Colombia's ban took effect in July 2018.⁴¹⁸¹⁹

Cyanide, under control

Today the mine recovers its gold with gravity concentration and cyanide, in closed circuits that discharge nothing into rivers.⁴⁶ Sedimentation and neutralization tanks treat the process water,¹⁰ and the Fairmined Standard requires cyanide detoxification and bans tailings discharges into water.²⁰

Cyanide is the lesser evil. It breaks down in the environment and does not accumulate in the food chain.²¹ It also recovers far more gold: often around 90 %, against rarely more than 30 % with whole-ore mercury amalgamation.²² Handled carelessly, though, cyanide can still harm rivers and aquatic life.²¹ Its closed circuits prevent exactly that.

Why Iquira gold is responsible

Iquira gold is responsible gold because every step behind it can be checked. It is Fairmined certified and independently audited every year, processed without mercury and with cyanide in closed circuits, and the miners receive a fair price plus a premium they invest themselves. Together with the second income from coffee, that makes Iquira a driver of sustainable development in Huila: jobs, housing, schooling and care in the region.

The standard has Colombian roots: it grew out of Oro Verde, a pioneering program of Afro-Colombian miners, which inspired the Alliance for Responsible Mining (ARM).

Audited every year since 2014

The cooperative has kept its Fairmined certification every year since 2014.² An independent certification body audits it against the Fairmined Standard. In 2018, it became the first artisanal mining organization recertified four times in a row.²³¹⁹

Protecting water, forests and soil

The Iquira gold mine protects the environment around its tunnels – water, forests and soil. The cooperative's own ambition: "We stand for 100 % clean mining that is friendly to the environment."¹ As documented by ARM, that means:

• No mercury in any of its processing plants.⁸
• Water recirculation, plus sedimentation and neutralization tanks for process water.²⁴¹⁰
• Waste rock without ore is used to maintain the local roads.²⁴
• No tree felling or hunting in the mining area, plus reforestation.⁸
• Water quality measurements and clean-ups of the water sources next to the mines.¹⁹

Fair pay and safe work

Fairmined guarantees a fair price plus a premium: at least 95 % of the London gold price and a Fairmined Premium of 4,000 US dollars per kilogram of gold. An elected premium committee decides how to spend it. Child labor is prohibited, and auditors check this at the mine every year.²⁰ The cooperative runs an occupational health and safety management system.²⁴

Where does the Fairmined Premium go?

The Fairmined Premium goes into safer mining, the workers and the villages. In the years with published figures, it ranged from about 60,000 to 131,000 US dollars, around 90,000 on average.²⁵

Safety comes first. From 2020 to 2023, the cooperative put 70 to 85 % of its premium into the mining operation, around 75 % on average.³²

Homes come next. In 2022, the cooperative bought one hectare of land for a housing project meant for at least 120 families; in 2023, it made the first payment, and 106 employees applied.³¹²

And care: Corazones de Oro, "Golden Hearts," is Iquira's own initiative for children with disabilities, created with the Fairmined Premium.³³ In 2023, it gave 14 children and teenagers from villages near Pacarní four months of language, sign language and psychomotor therapy.² In 2025, Fairmined Credits kept it running for six months, with teachers hired from the community.³³ Each Credit pays 4 US dollars of premium to the chosen mine.⁴

Equal opportunity at Iquira

In the cooperative, women and men work under the same rules. In 2022, 19 of the cooperative's 115 workers were women.³¹ The Fairmined Standard requires women miners to be represented on the premium committee and bars pregnant and breastfeeding women from any work with cyanide or mercury.²⁰

Mercedes Arias Martínez is one of Iquira's women miners. She is "demystifying the belief that mining is only for men," as ARM puts it.⁷ Compressors have made the work more technical, opening up opportunities, she says.⁷

"There is a myth that women cannot enter the tunnels because they make the gold disappear. That was not my case – I always worked. With the certification, we all play on the same side and we all meet the same parameters." – Mercedes Arias Martínez⁷

Nobel Peace Prize, Olympics and Palme d'Or

The Nobel Peace Prize medal is made of Fairmined gold – and it started with Iquira. Since 2015, the 18-karat medal has been made with gold from Fairmined certified mines in Colombia and Peru.³⁴³⁵

The first Fairmined Nobel medal

In 2015, the Nobel Peace Prize medal was struck in Fairmined gold for the first time, and the gold came from Iquira. That year's laureate was Tunisia's National Dialogue Quartet, for building democracy after the 2011 revolution.³⁶³⁷ In Huila, the news landed with pride:

"We are proud that the Peace Prize is made of gold from our cooperative. This is a huge international acknowledgement that allows us to show the world that responsible mining is possible." – Luis Alfredo González, Íquira cooperative³⁶

Peace for Colombia, gold from Huila

A year later, the prize came home. In 2016, the Nobel Committee honored Colombia's president, Juan Manuel Santos, for working to end more than 50 years of civil war. The war had cost at least 220,000 lives and displaced close to six million people.³⁸ Santos's medal was made with Fairmined gold from Iquira and from Coodmilla, a cooperative in Nariño, a region hit hard by the armed conflict.³⁹ Samlerhuset, the company behind the Fairmined medal initiative, called it "a double win for Colombia."⁴⁰

Here the circle closes: Santos negotiated the peace accord with the FARC guerrillas, and legal, audited mines like Iquira help it last. Around 60 % of Colombia's alluvial gold mining operates outside the legal framework, often financing organized crime, a UN report found in 2016.⁴¹ Iquira mines under a legal title, with an annual audit and a premium for the miners. Fairmined calls responsible, formalized small-scale mining "a peace-building opportunity for Colombian society and the State."³⁹

Olympic Laurel and Palme d'Or

Iquira's gold also crowns sport and film. In 2016, the International Olympic Committee created the Olympic Laurel, a Fairmined gold trophy presented at every opening ceremony of the Games; the first went to the Kenyan runner Kip Keino.⁴² According to ARM, it has contained Iquira gold since 2016.⁴³ Chopard has crafted the Palme d'Or of the Cannes Film Festival from ethical gold since 2014⁴⁴ – with Fairmined Gold from Iquira in 2015 and 2021.³⁹⁴³

Why Iquira is a model for the region

Iquira is a reference point for responsible mining in Colombia. Fairmined calls the cooperative "a pioneering example of best practice for responsible mining in Colombia."³⁹ In July 2019, it hosted mining organizations from six other municipalities to share its experience.²⁹ Locally, the cooperative is indispensable:

"Here eighty percent of the communities depend on the Cooperative, on mining." – José Ignacio Pérez¹⁰

Iquira gold at Fairever

We have an active partnership with the Iquira cooperative and regularly buy its Fairmined Gold. The Fairmined Standard keeps certified gold separate; we also keep it separated by mine wherever possible. When your Fairmined Gold comes from the Iquira gold mine, the label names the mine and its Fairmined ID, CO10003.

Iquira also produces some Fairmined Silver, which we buy and offer from time to time. More on Fairmined Silver, and on what to tell your customers, in our guide to Fairmined product claims.

FAQs: The Iquira gold mine, Colombia

Key takeaways

In a nutshell ...

• Gold mining and coffee farming can go hand in hand. In Iquira, Colombia, the mines give farming families a second income.
• Getting rid of mercury is possible. Iquira's first Fairmined Premium went into mercury-free processing plants.
• Legal, audited mining supports peace. Where illegal gold finances crime, Iquira's is licensed and audited every year.
• Ask for gold with a mine's name on it. With Fairmined Gold from Iquira, you know the cooperative behind it – a story to pass on to your customers.

Get active, be the change!

Gold from a named mine gives your jewelry a story worth telling. Our Fairmined products, from fine gold grain to alloyed wire, sheet and casting pieces, name the source mine and its Fairmined ID on the label. Browse our Fairmined Gold range.

Further reading

• Price, premium and rules of certified small-scale gold: Fairmined Gold explained.
• What Iquira is audited against every year: the Fairmined Gold Standard.
• More mines behind our gold: responsible gold mines and our partner mines.

Sources

1. Cooperativa Multiactiva Agrominera de Íquira, Website, accessed September 2026. Original quote: “Nos caracterizamos por una minería 100% limpia y amigable con el medio ambiente.” Translated by Fairever. ↩
2. Alliance for Responsible Mining, Fairmined Premium Report 2023, 2025, pp. 17–23. ↩
3. Our own estimate. In 2022, Iquira received a Fairmined Premium of 98,652 US dollars (footnote 31). At the standard premium of 4,000 US dollars per kilogram (footnote 20), that corresponds to 98,652 ÷ 4,000 ≈ 24.7 kg of gold sold as Fairmined, or 24.7 ÷ 12 ≈ 2.1 kg a month, rounded to around 2 kg. The estimate covers only gold sold as Fairmined. ↩
4. Alliance for Responsible Mining, Fairmined Credits – Communications and Mine Profiles, 2025. ARM dates the Colombian mercury ban to 2015; in mining, it took effect in July 2018 (footnote 18). ↩
5. Fairever, own information from the cooperative’s certificates, September 2026; Fairmined, Fairmined certified gold mining organizations and communities, accessed September 2026. ↩
6. La Nación (Neiva), Mineros de Íquira exportan el mejor oro de Colombia, September 13, 2015. ↩
7. Alliance for Responsible Mining, Community story: Mercedes Arias Martínez, September 4, 2019. ↩
8. Fairmined, Iquira, community profile, accessed September 2026. ↩
9. Fairmined, Coffee Beans and Gold Nuggets – New Fairmined certified mining cooperative in Colombia, September 18, 2014. ↩
10. Fairmined, Iquira Mining Organization: Pioneers in Ethical Mining, September 7, 2021. ↩
11. Jan Spille, Bergbaureise Kolumbien, 2021. The 2018 visit: Fairever, own information. ↩
12. Wikipedia (Spanish), Íquira, accessed September 2026. ↩
13. Gobernación del Huila, Celebramos el posicionamiento del Huila como primer productor de café del país, November 14, 2025 (figures from the Federación Nacional de Cafeteros). ↩
14. Bario Neal, Iquira-ARM Fairmined Gold Workshop, Part 2: Mining Conditions, 2014. ↩
15. UN Environment Programme, Global Mercury Assessment 2018, 2019. ↩
16. Alliance for Responsible Mining, Experiences in the production of gold with small-scale mining cooperatives of Peru, Bolivia and Colombia, February 2019. ↩
17. Alliance for Responsible Mining, Our Impact – ARM’s impact on artisanal and small-scale mining 2014–2016, 2017, pp. 11–14. ↩
18. Ministerio de Ambiente y Desarrollo Sostenible (Colombia), Ley 1658 de 2013, accessed September 2026. ↩
19. Alliance for Responsible Mining, Fairmined Premium Report 2021, 2022, pp. 19–26. The report prints the premium received as “131,318,988 USD”; since the 106,690 US dollars invested correspond to the stated 81 % (106,690 ÷ 131,319 = 81.2 %), we read it as 131,318.99 US dollars. ↩
20. Alliance for Responsible Mining, Fairmined Standard for Gold from Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining, including Associated Precious Metals, version 2.0, 2014, sections 2.1.7, 2.1.9, 2.1.10, 3.6, 4.1.1–4.1.2, 5.2.1, 5.2.5. ↩
21. Nyamunda, Review of the Impact on Water Quality and Treatment Options of Cyanide Used in Gold Ore Processing, IntechOpen, 2017. ↩
22. UNEP / Artisanal Gold Council, Reducing Mercury Use in Artisanal and Small-Scale Gold Mining: A Practical Guide, 2012. ↩
23. Alliance for Responsible Mining, Congratulations to the Cooperativa Multiactiva Agrominera of Íquira!, July 17, 2018. ↩
24. Fairmined, Iquira mining organization: an example that responsible mining is possible, April 8, 2021. ↩
25. Our own calculation from the four years with published amounts: 60,365 US dollars (2014–15, footnote 17), more than 69,000 (2016, footnote 26), about 131,319 (2021, footnote 19) and 98,652 (2022, footnote 31). Mean (60,365 + 69,000 + 131,319 + 98,652) ÷ 4 = 89,834, rounded to around 90,000; since the 2016 figure is a lower bound, the true mean is slightly higher. ARM has not published amounts for 2017–2020 and 2023. ↩
26. Alliance for Responsible Mining, Informe Premio 2016, 2017. ↩
27. Alliance for Responsible Mining, Fairmined Premium Use Report 2017, 2018, pp. 35–36. ↩
28. Alliance for Responsible Mining, Fairmined Premium Report 2018, 2019, pp. 28–29. ↩
29. Fairmined, An encounter to strengthen responsible mining, 2019. ↩
30. Alliance for Responsible Mining, Fairmined Premium Report 2020, 2021. ↩
31. Alliance for Responsible Mining, Fairmined Premium Report 2022, 2023, pp. 30–40. ↩
32. Our own calculation from the shares spent on strengthening the mining organization: 70 % (2020, footnote 30), 75 % (2021, footnote 19), 71 % (2022, footnote 31) and 85 % (2023, footnote 2). Mean (70 + 75 + 71 + 85) ÷ 4 = 75.25 %, rounded to around 75 %. ↩
33. Alliance for Responsible Mining, Annual Report 2025, 2026, p. 41. ↩
34. Fairmined, Fairmined gold shines again with the Nobel Peace Prize medal, November 25, 2019. ↩
35. The Norwegian Nobel Institute, The medal, accessed September 2026. ↩
36. Fairmined, Nobel Peace Prize made out of Fairmined gold, December 3, 2015. ↩
37. The Norwegian Nobel Committee, The Nobel Peace Prize for 2015, October 9, 2015. ↩
38. The Norwegian Nobel Committee, The Nobel Peace Prize for 2016, October 7, 2016. ↩
39. Fairmined, The Nobel Peace Prize Medal Shines Bright With Colombian Fairmined Gold, December 10, 2016. ↩
40. Samlerhuset, Fairmined, accessed September 2026. ↩
41. United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, New Colombia report sheds light on link between gold extraction and criminal activities, August 9, 2016. ↩
42. Fairmined, The Olympic Laurel: A new trophy made of Fairmined Gold, August 13, 2016. ↩
43. Fairmined, ARM recognizes the mining organization of Iquira for the 6th consecutive year applying responsible gold mining, October 8, 2021. ↩
44. Chopard, Sustainability milestones, accessed September 2026. ↩