TITLE: Global cobalt rush drives toxic toll near DRC mines
https://news.mongabay.com/2024/03/global-cobalt-rush-drives-toxic-toll-near-drc-mines/
EXCERPT: The global race to secure minerals critical to the clean energy transition is driving toxic pollution with severe health repercussions for communities living near some of the world’s largest cobalt and copper mines, a new report says.
U.K. corporate watchdog Rights and Accountability in Development (RAID) and African Resources Watch (AFREWATCH), based in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), documented the devastating human and environmental impacts of industrial cobalt mining in the DRC, which holds around 70% of the world’s reserves of the mineral.
Cobalt, mined as a byproduct of copper, is vital for the rechargeable batteries used in electric vehicles (EVs) and renewable energy technologies.
The vast majority of the DRC’s cobalt comes from large industrial mines in its southern cobalt and copper belt, with the remainder produced by artisanal sources. Cobalt production here increased by around 600% over the last three decades, according to research cited by RAID and AFREWATCH.
Their findings show that the mining city of Kolwezi, home to more than 500,000 people, appears to be turning into a “sacrifice zone,” with water contamination leading to health consequences and human rights abuses, the groups said in a report shared exclusively with Mongabay.
The report, published today, investigated five mines operated by Chinese and European multinationals. Together, they account for two-fifths of the global cobalt supply, much of it destined for major EV manufacturers including Tesla, Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz and General Motors.
The findings reveal “a glaring disconnect” between a mining industry keen to promote cobalt as sustainable and free from social harms, and the “stark reality” on the ground, said RAID executive director Anneke Van Woudenberg.
TITLE: Treasure hunters are flocking to Zimbabwe – but the toxic gold rush brings ecological disaster
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/climate-and-people/zimbabwe-illegal-gold-mining-mercury-pollution-toxic-water/
EXCERPT: Penhalonga has been overrun by thousands of illegal miners – men, women and young children – who have come to the region in search of gold.
As in so many gold rushes from history, the prospectors are causing immense damage. They are hacking down acre upon acre of lush vegetation.
They are clogging and redirecting streams with dams and waste materials or “tailings”. And worst of all, they are poisoning water-sources with the neuro-toxin mercury, endangering not only their own lives but the lives of all those who live nearby.
Weston Makoni, chairman of the Penhalonga Residents Association, told The Telegraph that the mining threatened to turn the area into a wasteland. “The illegal gold miners are now everywhere,” he said. “They are polluting our water and environment with mercury. Our livestock is also drinking this poisoned water; our crops are irrigated with the poisoned water. And the mercury is finding its way into our food chain.”
Zimbabwe’s crumbing economy, long afflicted by poor management, political conflict and climate change, has pushed millions into taking desperate measures to survive.
It is estimated that some 800,000 are now involved in illegal mining, and many will stop at nothing as they hunt for gold. In the country’s southeastern Chimanimani district, miners are tearing down vast timber plantations and farmlands. While in Kwekwe, in the center of the country, they are destroying schools, houses, roads and even railway lines.
In many ways it is not surprising – the World Food Programme estimates that nearly three million people in the country do not have enough food – but the use of mercury is causing immense damage.
TITLE: The world wastes more than 1 billion meals every day as hundreds of millions go hungry, UN report finds
https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/27/climate/un-food-waste-one-billion-meals-intl/index.html
EXCERPT: The world wasted 1.05 billion metric tons of food in 2022, meaning about a fifth of the food available to people was squandered by households, restaurants and other parts of the food service and retail sectors.
This is on top of the 13% of the world’s food lost as it makes its journey from farm to fork. In total, about a third of all food goes to waste during the production process.
These waste figures are particularly stark when contrasted with the report’s findings that about a third of the world’s population faces food insecurity and 783 million are affected by hunger.
The staggering statistics, published Wednesday in the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) Food Waste Index Report 2024, raise questions about the world’s ability to distribute the food it produces and highlights the role of food waste as a driver of climate change, according to UNEP Director Inger Andersen.
“Food waste is a global tragedy. Millions will go hungry today as food is wasted across the world,” Andersen said. “Not only is this a major development issue, but the impacts of such unnecessary waste are causing substantial costs to the climate and nature.”
The report distinguished between food “loss” — food discarded early in the supply chain, for instance vegetables that rot in fields and meat that spoils when unrefrigerated — and food “waste,” food thrown out by households, restaurants and stores.
Households wasted 631 million metric tons of food in 2022 — 60% of the total — while the food service sector accounted for 28% of the waste and retail 12%.
The average person wastes 79 kilograms (174 pounds) of food each year, meaning at least one billion meals of edible food are wasted in households each day, the report found.
Even these estimates are conservative, according to the report. While data collection has improved — with the number of data points at the household level almost doubling since the UN’s 2021 food waste report — it criticized countries for patchy monitoring.