Community members in Jhumlabang at a meeting in July. Image courtesy of Jhumlabang Village Foundation (JVF).

• Nepal’s government has granted a mining concession for what it calls the country’s biggest iron deposit in Jhumlabang, a remote farming community that could supply Nepal’s steel demand for years.

• Local residents say they were never properly consulted and fear displacement, water pollution, and destruction of forests and farmlands that sustain their livelihoods and cultural traditions.

• Community groups and Indigenous rights advocates argue the project violates Nepal’s obligations under international law guaranteeing the right to free, prior and informed consent for Indigenous peoples.

• Officials and the mining company insist due process will be followed, but villagers vow to resist the project, saying development should not come at the cost of their land, health and environment.

KATHMANDU — When the monsoon arrives in Jhumlabang village in Nepal’s far west, 35-year-old Til Kumari B.K. spends hours in the community forest harvesting mushrooms.

The rest of the year, she goes there to collect bark from the allo plant (Girardinia diversifolia), or Himalayan nettle, which is processed into a fiber for weaving fabric. During the dry season, Til Kumari also tends her farm.

“The farm feeds my family, while money from the mushrooms and fibers help pay for books and pens for my four children,” she says.

But all that could soon change, with her once sleepy village now in the headlines as home to Nepal’s “biggest iron deposit.” The area, which once provided copper ores for community use, now sits on a potential iron deposit.

There’s no full-scale mining operation here, for now. But officials have recently granted a concession, and community members are crying foul over what they say is the lack of meaningful community consultation, threats of displacement, and potential environmental harm even — as the government and mining companies emphasize economic development and resource self-sufficiency.

Government and company sources told Mongabay that Jhumlabang mine which contain a hematite deposit of around 200 million tonnes is twice as big as Dhaubadi iron mine that has an estimated 96.3 million metric tons of iron ores and that the new mine has the capacity to create job opportunities and reduce dependency on iron imports from neighboring countries.

But first it would have to overcome stern opposition from locals, who decry the way the mine is being pushed on them.

“Never mind obtaining free, prior, and informed consent — the community people were not even informed about the survey and its findings,” said Ajay Budha Magar, executive director of the Jhumlabang Village Foundation (JVF), a community-based organization.

Magar said community members reached a consensus at a village meeting in July, which they delivered in a letter to the local government and other government bodies, asking for the project to be halted. In August, however, the Department of Mines and Geology issued a letter to authorities in Bhume municipality, where Jhumlabang is located, to facilitate mining company Ramesh Steels to proceed with the mining activities in the demarcated area.

“The company is looking ahead to start initial drilling in 100 hectares in October,” Dinesh Karmacharya, a spokesperson for Ramesh Steels, told Mongabay. “In the initial phase we are planning to extract iron hematite to test the quality. Once the test confirms the hematite quality, the next step will be conducting the environmental impact assessment before the company formally starts the mining in 750 hectares [1,850 acres].”

To understand the key findings and possible threats from mining, Magar said the community people submitted a letter in 2024 to the mining department requesting the project details and a copy of the survey report.

“The department turned down the request, saying the information was confidential and should not be publicly shared,” Magar told Mongabay.

In early 2025, the department granted a mining concession to Elevate Minerals Pvt. Ltd., a sister company of Ramesh Steels, to mine about 750 hectares in the area. But the majority of community members opposed the decision, citing concerns that mining activity would likely to displace thousands of them from their homes while also impacting community forests, farmlands and water resources. They also pointed to threats to the area’s wildlife, which includes red pandas (Ailurus fulgens), Eurasian otters (Lutra lutra), and birds like the danfe (Lophophorus impejanus), Egyptian vulture (Neophron percnopterus), and Asian woolly necked stork (Ciconia episcopus) and fish like the asala (Schizothorax richardsonii), or snowtrout.

Homjung Rana Magar, principal of Shree Taksar Basic School in Jhumlabang, told Mongabay that the mining activities could disrupt the people’s sacred ties with their lands and territories.

“Our lives center around these lands, forests, and water sources that we depend on for our livelihoods and cultural rituals,” he said, adding that numerous waterways originate in and cross through the villages here.

“The mining would pollute rivers that the villages depend on for drinking water, irrigation, feeding livestock, fishing and spiritual practices,” Rana Magar said.

He also said mining would affect community forests and pasturelands. In an isolated terrain where health services aren’t easily accessible, community members are largely dependent on the local forests for medicinal herbs, he said. These include plants like chiraito (Swertia chirayita), samayo (Valeriana jatamansi), dalchini (Cinnamomum tamala), satuwa (Paris polyphylla), mahajari (Disporum cantoniense) and sunakhari, a group of more than 400 orchid species.

Rajan Pun Magar, a resident of neighboring Sima village, said he welcomed the promise of development — but only if it’s well-planned.

“But given that community voices have not been so far included in the decision-making process, there are growing worries and concerns among the people,” he told Mongabay. He said he knew of a few villagers who had been offered compensation equivalent to up to $6,300 per 0.05 hectares. But he added “the key question is whether the development is worth the social, economic and environmental harm from mining.”

Any amount of iron mining can be toxic to the environment and human health unless it’s well-planned and executed, said Deep Narayan Shah, assistant professor of environmental science at Tribhuvan University in Kathmandu.

“Iron mining leaches out radioactive elements like uranium, thorium, radium, which are harmful to both humans and wildlife. The mine tailings have a higher risk of polluting water bodies and aquatic ecosystems,” he told Mongabay.

However, Karmacharya from Ramesh Steels said the company plans to conduct the project’s environmental assessment once it finishes sample testing in 100 hectares.

Dharma Raj Khadka, a spokesperson from the Department of Mines and Geology, told Mongabay that Ramesh Steels is officially responsible for conducting mining activities now that the department has granted the permit.

“The community’s consent is important and the company should mandatorily clear due processes like holding proper dialogues about the project with the community and do environmental clearance before they proceed ahead with mining activities,” Khadka said.

Karmacharya said the company has consulted with community members, but noted that under the country’s 1985 mining law, all mineral resources are the property of the state.

For Indigenous rights lawyer Durga Mani Rai, the main issue is the apparent disregard for the right of the affected communities to consent to the project on their land. Rai, from the Lawyers’ Association for Human Rights of Nepalese Indigenous peoples (LAHURNIP), noted that Nepal is a signatory to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) and has also ratified International Labour Organization Convention 169, also known as the Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention. These legal instruments, which in Nepal trump local law, enshrine the right to FPIC and to self-determination for Indigenous peoples and communities, Rai said.

But they haven’t been respected and implemented in large-scale projects like the planned Jhumlabang mine, he said.

“In such a context, there is no point for negotiation,” said Magar from the Jhumlabang Village Foundation, “and we as community people shall keep pushing efforts to have our voices heard.”

As the monsoon’s dark clouds make way for clear skies, Til Kumari B.K. heads back into the forest for another foraging expedition — not knowing how many more she will get to make.

Citations:

Shrestha, M. B., Shrestha, G., Reule, S., Oli, S., Ghartimagar, T. B., Singh, G., … Savage, M. (2021). First evidence of Eurasian otter in Nepal in three decades. IUCN Otter Specialist Group Bulletin, 38(5), 279-291. Retrieved from https://www.iucnosgbull.org/Volume38/Shrestha_et_al_2021b.pdf

KC, K. B., Koju, N. P., Bhusal, K. P., Low, M., Ghimire, S. K., Ranabhat, R., & Panthi, S. (2019). Factors influencing the presence of the endangered Egyptian vulture Neophron percnopterus in Rukum, Nepal. Global Ecology and Conservation, 20, e00727. doi:10.1016/j.gecco.2019.e00727

Koirala, J., & Acharya, S. (2020). Overall scenario of iron and steel industry in Nepal. SSRN Electronic Journal. doi:10.2139/ssrn.3649292

This story was first published by Author Sonam Lama Hyolmo in Mongabay on 17 October 2025