Ecobreves – VENEZUELA: Informal Mining Affects Caura River Basin

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CARACAS, Sep 17 2012 (IPS) - The Caura River basin, an area of roughly five million hectares in southeastern Venezuela, is beginning to suffer the impacts of mining activity by "garimpeiros", illegal gold miners from Brazil, warn indigenous and environmental organizations. "A study of 1,174 Yekuana and Sanema indigenous people in the region, conducted by the La Salle Natural Sciences Foundation and Oriente University, found higher than normal levels of mercury in the hair of 92 percent of them,” Alejandro Lanz of the non-governmental Center for Ecological Research told Tierramérica.

Members of these indigenous communities eat fish from the Caura River and its tributaries, which run through protected areas. According to the indigenous organization Kuyujani and the Ara environmental network, the fish are contaminated by the tons of mercury released into the rivers every year by gold miners illegally operating in these protected areas.