2394 operations for months or years, destroying value that far exceeds any time savings (Franks, Davis, Brereton, & Vanclay, 2014). This paper draws upon experiences from resettlement processes in Peru, including operations at Las Bambas and Antamina, to examine how conventional resettlement methodologies systematically fail to capture the territorial complexity of Andean populations. We argue that this failure is not incidental but structural: standard tools were designed for sedentary populations with unitary territorial relationships, rendering them inadequate for communities whose livelihood systems are distributed across multiple ecological zones through extended kinship networks. Moreover, the impact-centred approach proves limited when compared to the multidimensional perspective offered by the Sustainable Wellbeing Framework. We propose an integrated methodology that repositions social intelligence as a strategic input for mine design and Life-of-Mine (LOM) planning, rather than a compliance function appended after engineering decisions have been fixed. This reframing—from social risk to strategic value—requires both methodological innovation and a shift in internal governance, including executive-level understanding of resettlement complexities. 2. THE METHODOLOGICAL GAP IN RESETTLEMENT PLANNING Conventional resettlement planning, as codified in the International Finance Corporation's Performance Standard 5 (IFC, 2012), the Land Acquisition and Involuntary Resettlement: Good Practice Handbook (IFC, 2023), and the ICMM Land Acquisition and Resettlement Guide (ICMM, 2015), is grounded in census-based baseline studies. These methodologies identify affected households by mapping residence—where people sleep—and cataloguing visible assets: houses, crops, livestock corrals. Compensation frameworks are then constructed around this inventory. While appropriate for many contexts, this approach contains an implicit assumption that proves limiting in Andean settings: that the census location of a household represents the entirety of its territorial linkage. In the Andean context, indigenous families practise multilocality as a rational territorial strategy. A single family unit may maintain productive activities in three to five geographically distinct locations: highaltitude grasslands for camelid herding, mid-zone plots for potato and grain cultivation, valley agriculture for maize and fruit, access to communal forests for firewood and medicinal plants, and urban life. Within Andean territorial rationality, multilocality emerges as a sophisticated asset management and risk reduction strategy for indigenous families. This model enables them to articulate a translocal production system spanning diverse ecological tiers: from high Andean grasslands for camelid herding and intermediate lands for tuber and grain cultivation, to temperate valleys for irrigated agriculture and communal forests for medicine and fuel, ultimately consolidating this network through insertion into urban dynamics (Altamirano, 1984; Golte & Adams, 1987; Murra, 1975). Standard census methodologies capture perhaps 30–40% of this territorial system. The remaining 60–70%—seasonal grazing routes, reciprocal labour networks, ceremonial sites, water sources accessed through kinship agreements—remains invisible to the baseline yet is fundamental to household resilience. When resettlement compensates only the visible fraction, families discover years later that access to critical resources has been severed without recognition or remedy. 2.1 Evidence from Peruvian Operations The case of Antamina at Yanacancha (1998–1999) is instructive. An accelerated resettlement action plan (RAP) relocated 53 families in merely two months, prioritising monetary compensation over land-forland exchanges due to construction schedule pressures. Critical errors included: (1) only individuals present during the census were deemed affected, ignoring seasonal residence patterns typical of high-altitude pastoral families; (2) within extended families, only the nuclear family unit in effective possession received compensation, disregarding co-ownership rights of other relatives in undivided landholdings; and (3) the absence of adequate baseline studies rendered proper assessment of socioeconomic conditions and impacts impossible. The complexity of social systems, land disputes, and family tensions created unforeseen obstacles whose implications emerged only years later (Salas, 2008, 2019; Gil, 2009). Las Bambas represents the second major milestone in the history of Peruvian mining resettlements. With an investment exceeding US$4.2 billion, the project envisaged the exploitation of the Ferrobamba,
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