Tantalum: A Valuable Ore Essay

The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), located in Central Africa, struggles daily because the government fails. The country has been in civil conflicts for nearly a decade, this however is not the main health hazard. In the 16th and 17th centuries, the Congo was a popular location for slave trade, while foreign powers intruded they also exposed the area to their diseases that have remained for centuries. These diseases have developed

The diamond industry impacts the people of West Africa by creating a whirlwind of corruption on a political level. In sierra Leone diamonds were a valuable part of the land and they were once legitimately sold up until Sierra Leone became independent in 1961. The following years of their independence corruption flooded the land. According to an online research paper it says “with that independence came corrupt leaders, manipulation of the people , rebel groups, rivalries and civil disputes”. The correlation implies that the diamond industry has created an environment that leaves people at risk of violence, and unfair treatment by their government. The longer the diamond industry is in effect, the longer West African people will suffer from the world market demanding diamonds. Because of globalization it doesn’t look

Every nation has a responsibility to its citizens to improve the economic, political and social well-being of its people. However, in the film Blood Diamond it is made clear that there is an exploitation of the people in Sierra Leone. This economic problem is fueled by three main concepts; poverty, production/resources and demand/supply. Through the analysis of the three main concepts it will be shown how the economic problem was the result of each sub-concept.

Blood Minerals is an article surrounding the bloodshed in the democratic republic of Congo over the 3TG metals used in the production of smartphones. The conflict surrounding the mining of the metals has resulted in deaths as well, many civilians having to flee the country. The vast wealth of natural metals such as tungsten, tin, tantalum and gold; has resulted in the abuse of basic human rights and the taxing of the individuals that mine them by militants. The companies that are under scrutiny are under the belief that having to declare the use of conflict minerals is a breach of their freedom of speech. Companies are often saying that they cannot determine whether they have received metals from conflict

Men, women, and children are all coerced, regularly at gunpoint, to mine coltan. Both the novel Blue Gold by Elizabeth Stewart and the CBC News article, “Coltan: A New Blood Mineral” shine light on the influence coltan mining has on people residing in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and the western consumers callowness to it.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo is one of the largest African countries located in central Africa. Congo is a country that has grown out of a history of Belgian colonisation. Congo also has a long history of an unstable government with a lot of problems with internal corruption. Being a land rich on natural resources with a poor government, Congo has been the perfect target for foreign exploitation of the lands resources. There is a high demand for cobalt from first world countries and the demand keeps rising every year. The current battery technology enables big technology companies to sell small handheld technological devices. Congo is one of the worlds leading supplier of cobalt. Almost half of the worlds cobalt was mined there. This cobalt can be found in any rechargeable battery such as the battery of a laptop or a smartphone. A cobalt rich battery has enabled us to have phones small enough to can fit in our pockets. These litihium-ion batteries can contain up to 10 grams of refined cobalt. Refined cobalt is the most expensive element in these batteries. Today, several Chinese companies are buying cheap cobalt from Congolese miners who working under dangerous conditions. The Congolese people are poor and desperate enough to do the hard and dangerous work. Families are forced involve their children in the mining work to be able to survive. The work pays less than minimum wage. The foreign mining business in Congo has caused Congolese people to sacrifice their

The economy was projected to grow at 8.5% from 2011 to 2015. However, the economy only grew at a rate of 2.5% (Kreckel). The inability to reach the projected growth contributes to the nation’s poverty. This is because in the colonial era, no money was made or spent by the people, impacting the nation today. Additionally, the Republic of Congo has the lowest household average salary in the world of $270 per month (“DR Congo”). Again, the low salary can be blamed on King Leopold as he took all the wealth for himself and gave none to the people. Although trade was good under Leopold’s rule, as an independent nation it has dramatically decreased. In 2015, the Republic of Congo made $5.2 million in exports (“The World FactBook”). In the time of imperialism, Leopold made $100 million in exports; which in today’s dollars would be equivalent to 2.9 billion dollars (Kreckel). Today, the Republic of Congo’s economy is struggling. 87% of woman are living off of $1.45 a day (“The World Factbook”). From the time of colonialism to now, the daily amount that people can spend has only increased from $.25 to $1.45. Within 109 years, the Congo has still been unable to make a drastic change in their society. Due to King Leopold’s actions, the people had nothing under his control and still have little

This elucidates the idea that black market trading rarely benefits the economic status but different corrupt organizations. Businesses should find a way to properly trade legal diamonds, while benefiting the country’s economic system. Although the natural resources in some parts of Africa are rich, the people are extremely poor. In other words, Richman also states, "The great irony of this, and what concerns the industry most, is that the item is being sold as a part of a romantic, everlasting, and pure relationship, but there are a lot of ugly shadows that have contributed to the industry 's success." Industries must end their contribution to the blood diamonds that fuel this nation’s civil wars.

From a similar Watson’s Institute report in the Colonization and Independence in Africa publication, a statement from a Congolese refugee informs of the brutality their family were subject to by the colonists. He recounted that “Women had to give up cultivating the fields and gardens… we could get no more rubber.” This quote then goes on to describe the horrors natives faced every day trying to locate more rubber for Europeans. Indigenous people were beaten, had their hands cut off, or got shot, simply for not finding enough rubber. In the long run, this forced greater poverty to befall the people of Congo: the meager wages paid to the Congolese could not be collected while the worker was recovering from injury. Moreover, a main source of food for families was farming. Farmers were primarily women. With them forced to cease cultivation of their crops, thousands starved to death. In modern day, poverty still plays a leading role in Congo. According to a report from the World Bank in 2015, “the poverty rate remains high in the DRC. The country is among the poorest countries in the world and was ranked 176 out of 187 countries on the Human Development in 2015.” Over half a century later, Congo is an acutely poor nation. This is a direct result of the over-harvesting of rubber, ivory, charcoal, and more that was ordered during colonization. If the natural resources in Congo were reaped and

The Nuclear Metals Incorporation or the Starmet Corporation is located on a 2229 Main Street in Concord, Massachusetts. The site produced depleted uranium products for armor piercing ammunition. They also created metal powders for medical applications, photocopiers, and specialty metal products, such as beryllium tubing for aerospace needs. From1958 to 1985, the holding basin that contained all the industries waste such as depleted uranium and copper was unlined, which caused issues.

The documentary details how the Democratic Republic of Congo, renamed Zaire, is in extreme poverty and largely underreported due to corruption. Zaire also holds a large portion of the world’s supply of a mineral that has been used in the production of nearly every cell phone and computer on the planet, making it very valuable and causing a number of violent wars over who would gain control over the mineral. This documentary correlates to the today’s continuing trends of colonization, globalization, and imperialism in Africa and countries in the Middle East over resources and minerals. These wars are extremely harsh and often feature children wielding automatic weapons, but the crimes and death rates from violence, hunger, and illness is still very underreported. The documentary When We Were Kings is another more realistic representation of the effects of colonialism in Africa.

Conflict Mineral is the denomination for the mineral that came from conflict zones. Eastern Congo is one of the principal origins of conflict mineral. The humanitarian crisis in Eastern Congo is caused by arms groups that control the production of different minerals. The most important of them are Gold ore, and the 3 T’s ( Cassiterite for Tin, Wolframite for Tungsten, Coltan for Tantalite).These minerals

Africa has not been benefitting from its vast mineral resources. All the illegal selling of Conflict diamonds is not helping the situation either. They cannot control the prices of the minerals on the global market. Many of the mining companies are owned by foreigners that means that mining employs less workers than either agriculture or services, it is also more expensive to operate. In addition to the loss of wealth, all the mining has contributed to the environmental destruction and helped fuel political conflict. It has caused many problems for Africa Sierra Leone during the 1990’s being one of the worse ones. The civil wars in Sierra Leone get their money illegal diamond trades. Smugglers from other countries such as Europe would come in come in to Africa and sneak diamonds out. Smugglers sometimes even go as far as to put the diamonds under the skin of goats just to get through. Consequences for getting caught trying to smuggle diamonds is jail time. Smugglers usually work for big diamond business. They get paid a lump sum of money to give businesses usually keep the diamonds in a stored away room on reserve. The reason they keep them on reserve and not put them on the market is because the less diamonds there are, letting big businesses go up on their prices. It is a strategy used by many companies trying to comply with conflict minerals. Many people don’t know this information

Stevens (2015) discusses the financial challenges that Arrium faces amid falling iron ore and steel prices. As Arrium confronts a falling Australian dollar against the US currency, the article comments on the need for Arrium to counteract losses and to repay $1.7 billion of amassing debt, the majority of which is denominated in US dollars.

D R Congo has been working on budget planning and a flexible monetary policy so as to strengthen the economy’s foundation. Despite being rich in natural resources the country remains one of the poorest in the world. It has been facing a fragile social environment and the economy must work towards contributing to human development.