Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) Living in Camp Roe in the Democratic Republic of Congo Credit: UN Photo/Eskinder Debebe

By Juliana White
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 26 2025 (IPS)

The demand for cobalt and other minerals is fueling a decades-long humanitarian crisis in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). In pursuit of money to support their families, Congolese laborers face abuse and life-threatening conditions working in unregulated mines.

Used in a variety of products ranging from vitamins to phone and car batteries, minerals are a necessity, making daily tasks run smoothly. The DRC is currently known as the world’s largest producer of cobalt, accounting for nearly 75 percent of global cobalt production. With such high demands for the mineral, unsafe and poorly regulated mining operations are widespread across the DRC.

The exploitation of workers is largely seen in informal, artisanal, small-scale mines, which account for 15 to 30 percent of the DRC’s cobalt production. Unlike large industrial mines with access to powerful machines, artisanal mine workers typically excavate by hand. They face toxic fumes, dust inhalation, and the risk of landslides and mines collapsing daily.

Aside from unpaid forced labor, artisanal small-scale mines can be a surprisingly good source of income for populations with limited education and qualifications. The International Peace Information Service (IPIS) reports that miners can make around 2.7 to 3.3 USD per day. In comparison, about 73 percent of the population in the DRC makes 1.90 USD or less per day. However, even with slightly higher incomes than most, miners still struggle to make ends meet.

Adult workers are not the only group facing labor abuse. Due to minimal regulations and governing by labor inspectors, artisanal mines commonly use child labor. The U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of International Labor Affairs reports that children between the ages of 5 and 17 years old are forced to work in mineral mines across the DRC.

“They are unremunerated and exploited, and the work is often fatal as the children are required to crawl into small holes dug into the earth,” said Hervé Diakiese Kyungu, a Congolese civil rights attorney.

Kyungu testified at a congressional hearing in Washington, D.C., on July 14, 2022. The hearing was on the use of child labor in China-backed cobalt mines in the DRC. Kyungu also said that in many cases, children are forced into this work without any protection.

Children go into the mines “…using only their hands or rudimentary tools without protective equipment to extract cobalt and other minerals,” said Kyungu.

Despite the deadly humanitarian issue at hand, the solution to creating a more sustainable and safe work environment for miners is not simple. The DRC has a deep history of using forced labor for profit. Starting in the 1880s, Belgium’s King Leopold relied on forced labor by hundreds of ethnic communities across the Congo River Basin to cultivate and trade rubber, ivory and minerals.

While forced and unsafe conditions kill thousands each year, simply shutting down artisanal mining operations is not the solution. Mining can be a significant source of income for many Congolese living in poverty.

Armed groups also control many artisanal mining operations. These groups use profits acquired from mineral trading to fund weapons and fighters. It is estimated that for the past 20 years, the DRC has experienced violence from around 120 armed groups and security forces.

“The world’s economies, new technologies and climate change are all increasing demand for the rare minerals in the eastern Congo—and the world is letting criminal organisms steal and sell these minerals by brutalizing my people,” said Pétronille Vaweka during the 2023 U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP) award ceremony.

Vaweka is a Congolese grandmother who has mediated peace accords in local wars.

“Africans and Americans can both gain by ending this criminality, which has been ignored too long,” said Vaweka.

One way to mitigate the crisis is through stricter laws and regulations. Many humanitarian organizations, such as the United Nations (UN) and the International Labour Organization (ILO), strongly advocate for such change.

The UN has deployed a consistent stream of peacekeepers in the DRC since the country’s independence in 1960. Notable groups such as the UN Operation in the Congo (ONUC) and the UN Organization Mission in the DRC (MONUC) were established to ensure order and peace. MONUC later expanded in 2010 to the UN Organization Stabilization Mission in the DRC (MONUSCO).

Alongside peace missions, the UN has made multiple initiatives to combat illegal mineral trading. They also created the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), which is dedicated to helping children in humanitarian crises.

The ILO has seen success through its long-standing project called the Global Accelerator Lab (GALAB). Its goal is to increase good practices and find new solutions to end child labor and forced labor worldwide. Their goal markers include innovation, strengthening workers’ voices, social protection and due diligence with transparency in supply chains.

One group they have set up to coordinate child protection is the Child Labour Monitoring and Remediation System (CLMRS). In 2024, the ILO reported that the program had registered over 6,200 children engaged in mining in the Haut-Katanga and Lualaba provinces.

Additionally, GALAB is working on training more labor and mining inspectors to monitor conditions and practices.

While continued support by various aid groups has significantly helped the ongoing situation in the DRC, more action is needed.

“This will require a partnership of Africans and Americans and those from other developed countries. But we have seen this kind of exploitation and war halted in Sierra Leone and Liberia—and the Africans played the leading role, with support from the international community,” Vaweka said. “We need an awakening of the world now to do the same in Congo. It will require the United Nations, the African Union, our neighboring countries. But the call to world action that can make it possible still depends on America as a leader.”

IPS UN Bureau Report

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Yasmine Sherif, Director of Education Cannot Wait, on a recent visit to a refugee site in the village of Modale, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo where children's education is being supported.  Sherif says for those living in protracted crises, the risks of GBV are compounded. Courtesy: Education Cannot Wait

By Judith Raupp
GOMA, DR Congo, Apr 27 2021 (IPS)

Yasmine Sherif, Director of Education Cannot Wait (ECW), has sounded the alarm on the need for Central African Republic refugee children and youth to access quality education during her visit to a refugee site in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) from Apr. 20-23.

During her field mission in the DRC, Sherif announced an ECW emergency education grant of $2 million which will allow access to quality education to CAR refugee and DRC host community children and youth along the border region of the DRC and CAR.

Sherif, accompanied by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi, visited a refugee site in the DRC village of Modale, located 30 kms from Yakoma, DRC, near the border of CAR. According to local authority estimates, more than 90,000 people have fled from CAR into DRC since December, when the presidential election in CAR sparked new violence. UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, has already registered 51,890 refugees to date.

In December, ECW announced a $22.2 million catalytic grant to provide education to over 220,000 children in the DRC. “In the coming two to three years, we need more funding of $60 million to 70 million and are urgently appealing to donors for an additional $45.3 in funding,” Sherif told IPS in a telephone interview from the DRC capital, Kinshasa.

DRC is one of more than 30 countries where ECW supports projects dedicated to education in emergencies and protracted crises. ECW is the United Nations global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises, and was established during the World Humanitarian Summit in 2016.

CAR, the northern neighbour of the DRC, has never fully returned to peace since 2013, when the Seleka rebel group overthrew then-president François Bozizé. Many of the refugees who fled CAR through forests into the DRC are living along riverbanks in hard-to-reach border areas and among host communities with extremely limited resources.

Both the DRC and the CAR are among the least-developed countries in the world, according to the UN Development Programme’s rankings. CAR finds itself on the second-to-last position at 188, DRC is ranked at 175.

Excerpts of the interview follow. The interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Children playing in a camp for displaced people in Bunia, in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo’s (DRC) Ituri province. The DRC is grappling with issues of insecurity and internally displaced people (IDPs) in some parts of the country while refugees escaping violence in the Central African Republic have fled to the country. Credit: Passy Mubalama/IPS

Inter Press Service (IPS): What is your mission in the DRC about?

Yasmine Sherif (YS): I want to draw international attention to several forgotten crisis in the DRC. We have a crisis in the education sector. There is a lot of insecurity and internally displaced people in some parts of the country, like in the North Kivu province. And we have, in the north, the refugees coming in from the Central African Republic. Despite this, there has to be a working education system across this vast country.

IPS: You were just coming back from a visit in a camp close to the border of CAR where the UNHCR relocates refugees who are living in remote areas. Now ECW launched a grant of $2 million for education. What exactly is the money spent on?

YS: The $2 million is initial seed funding, a kick-start only. We call on other donors to join to reach $7 million. Sixty percent of the CAR refugees are school children. Seventy percent of them didn’t attend school in CAR because of the crises there. With our partners on the ground, UNHCR, the government of the DRC and local organisations, we build schools and infrastructure, train teachers, offer mental and psychological help and a safe environment for refugee children and those in local communities. Yesterday, I spoke to children of refugees and communities who attend school together. They are all eager to learn. They have dreams and want to become policemen, doctors and lawyers in the future. Especially the refugee children show so much empathy for others – they want to help because they themselves saw horrible things. Some children are traumatised, but are still very resilient if we give them the tools like quality education.

IPS: How did local people welcome you? In some parts of DRC like North Kivu, people are frustrated with the UN and humanitarian organisations because they don’t see their living conditions any better although the humanitarians are there for more than 20 years. Two weeks ago there were even violent demonstrations against the UN peacekeeping mission “Mission de l’Organisation des Nations Unies pour la stabilisation en République démocratique du Congo” (Monusco), which people want to leave.

YS: People in the border region to CAR gave us a very warm welcome. If some Congolese are frustrated, it’s because they don’t get aren’t receiving the services delivered which they direly need. And this is because Monusco, the humanitarians and especially the educational sector, simply don’t have enough budget to do so. The DRC is a big country with a huge population. Logistics, traveling and the ability to have an impact demands a lot of money. Instead of increasing funds, some donors have cut them because they struggle at home with the economic crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. But, especially in a crisis, we can must show humanity while helping those people who have so much less. The more we give, the more will come back. Education is crucial. With inclusive quality education, you will also have gender equality, access to justice and less poverty. And how would one want to stop address climate change without education?

IPS: Is there anything else that you would like to add?

YS: Absolutely. I call an appeal urgently appeal towards to strategic public donors, as well as the private sector, companies and foundations: Help those people who lost everything and have suffered for decades. Even if there is the amidst a worldwide pandemic, it is in giving that we are human.

A child with a water canister strapped to his back lives in a camp for displaced people in Bunia, in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo’s (DRC) Ituri province. Many of those who live here have fled from atrocities committed by armed groups against civilians. Credit: Passy Mubalama/IPS

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