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https://theconversation.com/we-miners-die-a-lot-appalling-conditions-and-poverty-wages-the-lives-of-cobalt-miners-in-the-drc-220986>
"It was a cool, dusty morning in July 2021, when I first visited the Kamilombe
cobalt mine in Lualaba Province in south-eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.
Situated just outside Kapata on the south-west outskirts of Kolwezi, a mining
town that has historically served as an important centre for copper and cobalt,
Kamilombe is now one of hundreds of spontaneously emerging cobalt mining sites
in the region, where an enormous workforce of artisanal miners, called
“creuseurs”, extract and process cobalt ore using rudimentary hand tools.
Estimates suggest that as many as 11,000 men and women work on the site, the
majority of whom have no other means of deriving a livelihood.
Risking their lives, they tunnel deep into the red earth, excavating cobalt in
shafts that descend as deep as 100 metres, and yet they receive almost none of
the profits. Instead, they endure perilous working conditions, human rights
abuses, and are paid poverty wages by agents and buyers who source small
amounts from each miner at so called “buying houses”.
This story of labour exploitation and unequal exchange in Africa has become an
all-too-familiar one to me. For the last 20 years, I’ve dedicated my academic
career to researching the social, political and economic aspects of natural
resources extracted or grown in sub-Saharan Africa."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
