Natural resource mining is one of the most polluting and devastating activities for the environment, which also has serious social impacts. To manufacture our electronic devices, various metals and minerals are necessary, such as gold, silver, coltan, lithium, nickel, rare earths, bauxite, among others. However, mining causes serious damage, such as soil degradation, deforestation, water pollution, and the generation of high greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to climate change.
Serious human rights violations also occur in the sector and in the local communities around it. Regions such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Chile, Argentina, Bolivia and Brazil, for example, have become points of conflict due to their wealth of minerals such as coltan, lithium and copper
Each mine has its own context, although the exploitation of these resources is often done under precarious working conditions and without adequate protections for female workers. In the mining sector we also find the presence of child labour, despite being illegal, and lack of transparency that leads to the presence of strong corruption.
Most workers suffer from health problems derived from continuous exposure to toxic materials, such as respiratory diseases and muscle disorders. Children work more than 12 hours a day without protection and are exposed to toxic materials that can cause serious respiratory diseases and, in extreme cases, even death. In the lithium triangle, mining operations occupy ancestral lands of the indigenous communities of Argentina, Bolivia and Chile, altering their traditional lifestyle and creating serious problems of lack of water, essential for their survival and maintenance of their local ecosystems.
Local communities in many cases benefit little from the exploitation of these resources, and in any case are negatively affected. To this we must add that the extraction of raw materials is part of theplunder of resources made in the Global South by the Global North, and that ends up reproducing the colonial model, in which the strongest economies pay the raw materials at a very low price to impoverished countries, which will then have to import manufactured products whose value is much higher. There is an unequal exchange which does not help countries rich in raw materials to be more prosperous.
→ Women working in mining are also affected by double oppression, as they suffer from both labour exploitation and gender discrimination. Depending on the context of each mine, some work selling food and water to miners, others work in the mine. Gender violence and sexual assault are unfortunately common in many mining areas, where the lack of legal protection and social support increases the vulnerability of these workers.
In informal settlements, young women are often forced into prostitution, with a high risk of sexual transmission infections and other health problems. Mining women, often relegated to the most dangerous or exhausting tasks, receive lower wages only because they are women.
