An area of illegal mining activity was raided by the Brazilian Federal Police in the eastern Amazon on Jan. 17, where their precarious installations and housing, as well as their equipment, were destroyed. The fight against illegal mining, especially in indigenous territories, intensified after a new tragedy of deaths of Yanomami indigenous people caused by encroaching garimpeiros or informal miners became headline news. CREDIT: Federal Police

By Mario Osava
RIO DE JANEIRO, Jan 29 2024 (IPS)

Artisanal mining, or “garimpo” as it is known in Brazil, has returned to the headlines as a factor in the deaths of Yanomami indigenous people, whose territory in the extreme north of Brazil suffers constant encroachment by miners, which has intensified in recent years.

In the first few days of the year, Yanomami spokespersons denounced new invasions of their land and the suspension of health services, in addition to the violence committed by miners or “garimpeiros”, which coincided with the fact that the military withdrew from areas they were protecting.

Furthermore, the media published new photos of extremely malnourished children. In response, the government promised to establish permanent posts of health care and protection in the indigenous territory.

“But what they are involved in there is not garimpo but illegal and inhumane mining practices,” said Gilson Camboim, president of the Peixoto River Valley Garimpeiros Cooperative (Coogavepe), which defends the activity as environmentally and socially sustainable when properly carried out.

“Garimpo is mining recognized by the Brazilian constitution, with its own legislation, which pays taxes, is practiced with an environmental license and respects the laws, employs many workers, strengthens the economy and distributes income,” he told IPS by telephone from the headquarters of his cooperative in Peixoto de Azevedo, a town of 33,000 people in the northern state of Mato Grosso.

Coogavepe was founded in 2008 with 23 members. Today it has 7,000 members and seeks to promote legal garimpo and environmental practices, such as the restoration of areas degraded by mining.

But it is difficult to salvage the reputation of this legal part of an activity whose damage is demonstrated by photos of emaciated children and families decimated by hunger and malaria, because the encroachment of miners pollutes rivers, kills fish and introduces diseases to which indigenous people are vulnerable because they have not developed immune defenses.

Garimpeiros and indigenous deaths

The humanitarian tragedy among the Yanomami people became big news in January 2023 when Sumaúma, an Amazonian online media outlet, denounced the deaths of 570 children under five years of age, due to malnutrition and preventable diseases, during the far-right government of former president Jair Bolsonaro (2019-2022).

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who took office on Jan. 1, 2023, visited Yanomami territory and mobilized his government to care for the sick and expel illegal miners, destroying their equipment and camps. But a year later, the resumption of mining activity and a resurgence of hunger and deaths were reported.

Moreover, the entire extractivist sector has a terrible reputation due to tragedies caused by industrial mining. Two tailings dams broke in the southeastern state of Minas Gerais in 2015 and 2019, killing 289 people and muddying an 853-kilometer-long river and a 510-kilometer-long river.

Brazil is the world’s second largest producer of iron ore, following Australia. Iron ore is the main focus of industrial mining in the country.

Garimpo is mainly dedicated to gold, and accounts for 86 percent of its production. Garimpeiros also produce cassiterite (the mineral from which tin ore is extracted) and precious stones, such as emeralds and diamonds. Its major expansion, many decades ago, was along rivers in the Amazon jungle, to the detriment of indigenous peoples and tropical forests.

Indigenous people protest in the state of Roraima in northern Brazil against the invasion of Yanomami territory by garimpeiros or artisanal miners, who often practice illegally. CREDIT: Alberto César Araújo / Amazônia Real

Threat to the environment and health

Currently, 97.7 percent of the area occupied in Brazil by artisanal mining is in the Amazon rainforest, where it reaches 101,100 hectares, according to MapBiomas, a project launched by non-governmental organizations, universities and technology companies to monitor Brazilian biomes using satellite images and other data sources.

The production of gold uses mercury, which has contaminated many Amazonian rivers and a large part of their riverside population, including indigenous groups, such as the Munduruku people, who live in the basin of the Tapajós River, one of the great tributaries of the Amazon with an extension of 2,700 kilometers.

Garimpo dumps about 150 tons of mercury in the Brazilian Amazon rainforest every year, the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) estimates. The fear is that the tragedy of Minamata, the Japanese city where mercury dumped by a chemical industry in the mid-20th century killed about 900 people and caused neurological damage in tens of thousands, may be repeated here.

Brazil produced 94.6 tons of gold in 2022, according to the National Mining Agency. But the way it is extracted varies greatly, based mainly on informal mining, of which illegal mining makes up an unknown percentage.

Three prices govern this production, according to Armin Mathis, a professor at the Núcleo de Altos Estudos Amazónicos of the Federal University of Pará, who lives in Belém, the capital of this Amazonian state, with 1.3 million inhabitants.

The price of gold in Brazil; the price of diesel, which represents a third of the cost of gold mining; and the cost of labor are the three elements that determine whether the garimpo business is profitable, the German-born PhD in political science, who has been studying this activity since he arrived in Brazil in 1987, explained to IPS from Belém.

This mining was in fact artisanal, but it began to use machines, especially the backhoe, in the 1980s, which is why diesel increased its costs. And unemployment and periods of economic recession, in the 1980s and in 2015-2016, made garimpo more attractive.

In those periods and the following years, invasions of Yanomami territory, which also extends through the state of Amazonas in southwestern Venezuela, became more massive and aggressive. But the consequences for the native people living in vast areas of the rainforest only become news on some occasions, like now.

Small airplanes seized by police and environmental authorities were at the service of illegal miners in Roraima, an Amazonian state in the extreme north of Brazil. This is where most of the Yanomami Indians live, currently the main victims of illegal, mechanized mining. CREDIT: Federal Police

From artisanal to mechanization

Mechanization has restructured the activity. Machines are expensive and require financiers. Entrepreneurs have emerged to manage the now more complex operations, as well as others who only own and rent out the equipment.

In addition, the owners of small airplanes that supply the mining areas and facilitate the trade of the extracted gold became more powerful. The hierarchy of the business has expanded.

“We must differentiate between garimpo and the garimpeiros. This is not a rhetorical distinction. The garimpeiro, who works directly in the extraction of gold, is more a victim than a perpetrator of illegal, predatory and criminal mining. The person responsible lives far away and gets rich by exploiting workers in slavery-like labor relations,” observed Mauricio Torres, a geographer and professor at the Federal University of Pará.

“The garimpeiro, depicted as a criminal by the media, pays for the damage,” he told IPS by telephone from Belém.

The workers recognize that they are exploited, but feel that they are a partner of the garimpo owner, as they earn a percentage of the gold obtained. They work hard because the more they work, the more they earn.

A large part of the garimpeiros along the Tapajós River, where this kind of mining has been practiced since the middle of the last century, are actually landless peasant farmers who supplement their income in the garimpo business, when agriculture or fishing does not provide what they need to support their families, Torres explained.

Therefore, agrarian reform and other government initiatives that offer sufficient income to this population could reduce the pressure of the garimpo on the environment in the Amazon rainforest, which affects the region’s indigenous and traditional peoples, he said.

The situation of the garimpeiros also differs according to the areas where they work in the Amazon jungle, Mathis pointed out. In the Tapajós River, where the activity has been taking place for a longer period of time and is already legal in large part, coexistence is better with the indigenous Munduruku people, some of whom also became garimpeiros.

In Roraima, a state in the extreme north on the border with Venezuela and Guyana, where a large part of the territory is made up of indigenous reserves, illegal mining is widespread and includes the more or less violent invasion of Yanomami lands.

On the other hand, as the local economy depends on gold, the population’s support for garimpo, even illegal and more invasive practices, is broader than elsewhere. There, former president Bolsonaro, a supporter of garimpo, won 76 percent of the votes in the 2022 runoff election in which he was defeated by Lula.

Another component that aggravates the violence surrounding garimpo and, therefore, the crackdown on the activity, is the expansion of drug trafficking in the Amazon rainforest. The informality of the mining industry has facilitated its relationship with organized crime, whether in the drug trade or money laundering, said Mathis from Belém.

Juana Martínez takes part in an October 2021 protest in Lima organized by the platform of people affected by heavy metals in front of Congress, holding a sign that reads: "Cajamarca. Mercury Never Again". She was 29 years old when the mercury spill occurred in her town, Choropampa, in Peru’s northern Andes highlands. Several of her relatives have since died from the effects of the heavy metal and one of her sisters became sterile. CREDIT: Courtesy of Milagros Pérez

By Mariela Jara
LIMA, Jun 3 2022 (IPS)

“We are not asking for money, but for our health, for a dignified life,” is the cry of the people of Choropampa, which lawyer Milagros Pérez continually hears 22 years after the environmental disaster that occurred in this town in the department of Cajamarca, in Peru´s northern Andes highlands, on the afternoon of Jun. 2, 2000.

On that day, a Yanacocha Mining company truck spilled 150 kilograms of mercury on its way to Lima, the capital, leaving a glowing trail for about 40 kilometers on the road that crosses Choropampa, a town of 2,700 people located at an altitude of almost 3,000 meters.

The company, 95 percent of which is owned by a U.S. corporation, set up shop there in 1993, 48 kilometers north of the city of Cajamarca, where it operates between 3,400 and 4,200 meters above sea level. Yanacocha (black lagoon in the Quechua indigenous language) is considered the largest gold mine in South America and the second largest in the world, although its production is declining.

Children and most of the population started collecting the shiny droplets scattered on the ground and in the following days, responding to a call from the mining company that announced that it would purchase the material, they picked it up with their own hands, unaware of its high toxicity and that this exposure would affect them for life.

Before the disaster, the town was known for its varied agricultural production which, together with trade and livestock, allowed the impoverished inhabitants of Choropampa to get by as subsistence farmers.

But their poverty grew after the mercury spill, in the face of the indifference of the authorities and the mining company, which never acknowledged the magnitude of the damage caused.

The Choropampa road, now paved, where a truck of a large gold mining company spilled mercury on Jun. 2, 2000, affecting this small town in the department of Cajamarca, in Peru’s northern Andes highlands. The only change since then has been the paving of the road. CREDIT: Grufides

Violated rights

A report, also from the year 2000, by the Ombudsperson’s Office concluded that of the total mercury spilled, 49.1 kilos were recovered, while 17.4 remained in the soil, 21.2 evaporated, and the whereabouts of 63.3 were not identified.

The autonomous government agency also questioned the actions of the authorities and the mining company, referring for example to the extrajudicial agreements they reached with some of the affected local residents, which included clauses prohibiting them from filing any complaint or lawsuit against the company, and which “violate the rights to due process and effective judicial protection of those affected.”

Twenty-two years after the incident, Choropampa’s demands for reparations and access to justice are still being ignored. Pérez, a lawyer with the non-governmental Information and Intervention Group for Sustainable Development (Grufides), based in Cajamarca, said in an interview with IPS that the effects on the local territory and people’s health are evident.

She explained that despite the attempt to hush up the incident, it received enough attention that then president Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000) was forced to promise “an investigation, punishment and reparations” – although these did not happen.

Against a backdrop of poverty and lack of opportunities, the mining company took advantage of the local residents’ goodwill and reached compensation agreements with some of them in exchange for their silence. There were also collective reparation agreements such as the construction of a town square, but nothing that actually contributed to remedying and addressing the damage caused to the people, say experts and activists.

For instance, the mining company committed to a private health plan for the people who were affected by the disaster, but it ended up being “a sham,” she said.

“They give them pills for the pain and nothing more, to people affected by mercury, while every day it becomes more difficult for them to support their families as they suffer terrible loss of vision, decalcification, bone malformations, and permanent skin irritations, which make it impossible for them to work their land and lead the lives they had before,” said Pérez.

Lawyer Milagros Pérez, who is dedicated to fighting for the reparations demanded by the population of Choropampa after a mercury spill in 2000 by the Yanacocha Mining Company in this town in the northern Andean department of Cajamarca, Peru, which caused irreversible damage to their health and lives. CREDIT: Mariela Jara/IPS

Women, affected in very specific ways

The Grufides attorney stated that there is also an additional impact that has remained in the dark until now.

“Although the population in general has suffered damage to the corneas, nervous system, digestive system, skin, and bone malformations, we have noticed specific problems in women related to their reproductive capacity, such as premature births, miscarriages, sterility and births of infants with malformations, which have not been investigated,” she said.

Pérez criticized the fact that to date the affected population continues without specialized attention, with access only to a health post with a general practitioner and three nurses, who lack the capacity to deal with the specific ailments caused by contamination with heavy metals such as mercury.

“What the women are experiencing is part of this overall situation, effects that began in the year 2000 after the spill, according to the testimonies we have been collecting. But they need a specialized health diagnosis, something as basic as that, in order to begin to remedy the damage,” she said from Cajamarca, the capital of the department.

Pérez also mentioned the effects on women’s mental health and their role as caregivers, as a collateral aspect of this tragedy that has not yet been documented.

She cited the example of Juana Martínez, who is known for her defense of the rights of the local population and who for this reason has been threatened and slandered by unidentified persons.

“I tell her, Juanita, you don’t die because everyone needs you, that keeps you alive; because as a result of the contamination, her sister, her mother-in-law and her sister-in-law all died. There is a chain of contamination, the problem is much bigger and it affects different generations, but they don’t want to study it,” she said.

IPS tried to contact Martínez, but was unable to do so because she lives in a remote area far from the town, where there is no cell phone signal.

Denisse Chávez is an ecofeminist activist and member of the team promoting the Third International Tribunal for Justice and Defense of the Rights of Pan-Amazonian-Andean Women, to be held Jul. 30 in the city of Belem do Pará, Brazil, where the case of the women of Choropampa, whose health was affected by mercury contamination in 2000, will be presented. CREDIT: Mariela Jara/IPS

Getting their voices heard in an international ethical tribunal

Denisse Chávez, an ecofeminist activist, told IPS that the case of the women of Choropampa affected by the mercury spill will be among those presented at the Third International Tribunal for Justice and Defense of the Rights of Pan-Amazonian-Andean Women, to be held Jul. 30, 2022, in the city of Belem do Pará in Brazil’s Amazon region.

The tribunal is one of the emblematic activities to take place within the framework of the 10th Pan-Amazonian Social Forum, which under the slogan “weaving hope in the Amazon” will bring together for four days some 5,000 people from different countries of the Amazon basin interested in coordinating actions in defense of nature and the Amazon rainforest.

Chávez, a member of the group organizing the tribunal, which also includes feminist and human rights activists from Brazil, Ecuador, Colombia and Uruguay, denounced that the Peruvian State has failed to make the company compensate the damage caused to the local population or to make visible the specific impacts on women, in the past 22 years.

“Choropampa is an area far from the city and with a highly vulnerable population, with high rates of poverty and illiteracy. In more than two decades no government has been interested in solving the problems while the mining company continues to offer solutions on an individual basis, which is violent since money is offered so that people do not talk,” she added.

She said the tribunal will bring the case international visibility, like others from Brazil, Colombia and Ecuador, which “have in common the impact caused by extractive economic activities on the lives of our peoples and especially on the bodies of women, which is still not taken into account or discussed.”

The ethical, symbolic tribunal will issue a judgment specifying the violations of women’s human rights and the obligations incumbent upon States and corporate actors.

Chávez said the document would be sent to the Peruvian authorities, both in Cajamarca and at the national level. “We cannot allow impunity in the Choropampa case; we will continue to keep the memory of what happened alive,” she said.

Intervention plan

In December last year, the Peruvian government approved the creation of a “Special Multisectoral Plan for the integral intervention in favor of the population exposed to heavy metals, metalloids and other toxic chemical substances”, which will include the different regions whose populations have been harmed by polluting activities.

Pérez pointed out that the government’s decision was the result of pressure from civil society and groups affected by heavy metals. But Choropampa has not been included in this first stage, despite the lasting impact on its population and soils.

“It is supposed to expand gradually but we will be closely watching the decisions that are taken because a protocol of attention and budgets for diagnostics must be elaborated,” she said.

Artisanal gold mining in Latin America uses mercury, a practice that should be modified in countries that have ratified the international Minamata Convention for the control of this toxic metal. Credit: Thelma Mejía/IPS

By Emilio Godoy
MEXICO CITY, Sep 26 2017 (IPS)

For environmentalist Patricia Ruiz the only word that comes to mind is “devastating,” when describing the situation of mercury mining in her home state of Querétaro in central Mexico.

“There are a large number of pits (from which the mercury is extracted), and there are the tailing ponds containing mining waste, all of which drains into the rivers. These are people who don’t have other options, they risk their health, their family genetics. There are many people involved, who have no alternative employment,” said Ruiz, the founder of the Sierra Gorda Ecological Group.

Her non-governmental organisation is dedicated to protecting the 383,567-hectare Sierra Gorda Biosphere Reserve, which is home to a rich ecosystem as well as100,000 people, distributed in five municipalities and 638 communities.

Querétaro and the northern state of Zacatecas have become major producers of mercury, the extraction of which is mainly in private hands and practiced without a license. The mercury is mostly exported to countries such as Bolivia and Colombia, where it is used mainly in the artisanal mining of gold.

The rise in production in Mexico was a consequence of export bans in the United States and the European Union since 2011, which prompted Mexico to step in to fill the gap.

Replacing mercury in artisanal mining is a challenge that Mexico is now facing in order to comply with the Minamata Convention, which entered into force on Aug. 16, and which will celebrate its first meeting of the Conference of the Parties in Geneva from Sept. 24-29.

The treaty prohibits new mercury mines and stipulates the phasing out of existing mines, the reduction of mercury use in a number of products and processes, the promotion of measures to curb emissions into the atmosphere and seepage into the soil and water, the regulation of artisanal and small-scale gold mining and proper management of contaminated sites.

The “Mexican Mercury Market Report”, produced in 2011 by the Commission for Environmental Cooperation, estimated that there are nearly 27 million tonnes of mercury waste accumulated in mines and the chlor-alkali industry.

Primary mercury mines account for 43 percent of these deposits – some 11.75 million tons – while the secondary production of old deposits of mine waste or tailings in Zacatecas contribute another 14.9 million, and the chlor-alkali industry accounts for 240,000 tonnes in two plants.

A report by the governmental National Institute of Ecology and Climate Change (INECC), obtained by IPS, shows that eight of Mexico’s 31 states have mercury mines that feed the national trade in dental fillings, lamps and raw materials for artisanal gold mining, as well as the increasing exports.

Some 300 artisanal mercury mines operate in Querétaro, while extraction from tailings ponds is attractive due the value of amalgamated silver. Mercury mining in Querétaro is concentrated in three municipalities.

In that state, two regions, with a total of nine mining districts, contain mercury. Between 1995 and 2016, the state government supported three projects with potential mercury deposits.

In Zacatecas, four of 17 mining regions have mercury and six of 116 mining projects involve mercury exploration and exploitation.

Artisanal gold mining is active in 10 states, and more than 3,000 people work in this activity.

Mercury is obtained from cinnabar ore, which is crushed and fed into a furnace or kiln to be heated, generating toxic mercury vapor with toxic properties.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the main effect of exposure to fish and seafood contaminated by mercury in fetuses and infants is impaired neurological development. Mercury, which has
neurotoxic characteristics, accumulates in the body.

In Latin America, Bolivia, Brazil, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Honduras, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru and Uruguay have already ratified the Convention. But only Brazil has submitted its report to the secretariat of the mercury control treaty, as only nine other countries around the world and the European Union have done.

Measures to curb the production of mercury in other countries have turned Mexico into the second largest supplier in the world, after Indonesia. In July this country exported 75 tons to Bolivia and 9.55 to Chile, while sporadic sales were reported to Argentina, Colombia, Cuba, Nicaragua, Panama and Paraguay.

In 2016, Bolivia was also the top destination, with 193 tons, while Colombia imported 41.5, even though it had banned the use of mercury in artisanal mining in 2013.

The coordinator of the non-governmental Center for Analysis and Action on Toxics and their Alternatives (CAATA), Fernando Bejarano, said that Mexico saw the upturn in mercury mining coming and did not take action.

“This is a social problem linked to poverty and we must treat it according to that perspective, and not only as an environmental issue. But there is no clear multisectoral approach. In the coming years production may grow even further,” the expert told IPS.

In his view, “Mexico lacks a clear policy on the handling of hazardous substances and people continue to be exposed to them.”

A report by the Federal Attorney General’s Office of Environmental Protection (Profepa), to which IPS had access, states that mining is carried out with no environmental damage mitigation or prevention of health effects.

Mines, the report adds, lack the infrastructure to prevent polluting emissions from the furnaces, and there is inadequate management of mining waste, which pollute water and soil.

Their “2015 studies on air quality and its impact in the central region of Mexico”, obtained by IPS, which assessed emissions from 83 mines, concluded that there is a risk of toxicity for workers in the mining area of Querétaro and the surrounding population, where it found high concentrations of the mineral.

INECC this year detected high concentrations of mercury in the basement of a shopping center in Zacatecas, where products for sale are stored.

For activist Patricia Ruiz, winner of at least five prizes in ecology, Mexico should work on a plan based on people´s needs.

“The semi-desert (of the region) offers possibilities. It can provide employment for many years and the mines would be shut down. It requires financial resources to be able to pay temporary employment and cover the pits,” she said.

Mexico, which anticipates designing a plan of action to modify artisanal gold mining, will have to adapt its legal framework to the Minamata Convention. It has already identified four sites and 15 communities contaminated with mercury.

“The state and municipal actors must be informed about the risks. There must be an orderly plan of transition. It is a national responsibility, we should not just wait for international resources to come,” Bejarano said.

In Geneva, CAATA and other NGOs will determine the presence of mercury in body creams from places such as Quéretaro.

Mexico is waiting for approval by the Global Environment Facility to finance a seven million dollar environmental risk reduction initiative in mining in Querétaro. At the end of the year, the government will complete an assessment of the country’s situation in this regard.

Olubunmi Olusanya of the Federal Ministry of Environment, Nigeria is keen on phasing out mercury-added products. Credit: Miriam Gathigah/IPS

By Miriam Gathigah
NAIROBI, May 30 2017 (IPS)

With a new international treaty, an increasing number of African countries are committing to phasing out mercury, a significant health and environmental hazard.

Research has shown that maternal exposure to mercury from contaminated fish can cause learning disabilities in developing babies. When inhaled, mercury vapor can also affect the central nervous system, impair mental capacity and, depending on levels of exposure, even lead to death."The ripple effect of using mercury is very costly in both human health and harm to the environment.” --Olubunmi Olusanya

“Despite the danger that mercury poses, it is still widely used, especially in Africa, and this is of great concern,” says Olubunmi Olusanya of the Federal Ministry of Environment, Nigeria.

He told IPS that “While Africa does not manufacture mercury added products, the continent is a leading importer of mercury. The ripple effect of using mercury is very costly in both human health and harm to the environment.”

It is within this context that the Zero Mercury Working Group recently held a series of meetings in Nairobi, Kenya to address phasing out of mercury.

The Zero Mercury Working Group is an international coalition of over 95 public interest environmental and health non-governmental organizations from more than 50 countries around the world, with several NGO members coming from African countries.

“Phasing out mercury will mean replacing mercury added products such as thermometers, thermostats and batteries with alternatives, but it also means reducing and ultimately eliminating the use of mercury in artisanal and small-scale gold mining,” explains Elena Lymberidi-Settimo, International Co-coordinator of the Zero Mercury Working Group.

According to the Zero Mercury Working Group, artisanal and small scale gold mining (ASGM)  is a complex global development issue. It uses and releases substantial amounts of mercury in mineral processing, usually in highly unsafe and environmentally hazardous conditions.

Haji Rehani, a Senior Programme Officer at the Agenda for Environment and Response Development in Tanzania, who works closely with artisanal and small scale gold mining communities, says, “This kind of mining is the largest demand sector for mercury globally.”

He says that mercury is used to bind the gold to form an amalgam, which helps separate it from the rock, sand and other materials. The amalgam is then heated to vaporize the mercury, exposing miners and contaminating the environment while leaving the gold behind.

“There is a need to engage as many stakeholders as possible from the miners all the way to governments,” he advises.

He told IPS that African governments have shown the greatest worldwide commitment to addressing mercury as a health hazard and to ultimately phase it out.

Rehani says that this commitment has been demonstrated through Africa’s active involvement in the adoption of the Minamata Convention on mercury in October 2013, when 128 countries signed on.

“This legally binding agreement was developed and adopted to protect human life and environment from mercury emissions. It has clear time-bound targets for phasing out the manufacture, export or import of a number of mercury added products specified in the Convention,” he expounds.

At the moment, 52 countries have ratified the Convention, marking a significant milestone since the Convention requires at least 50 countries to ratify in order for the treaty to enter into force.

The Convention will therefore come into effect in the next 90 days. This further reinforces the significance of the zero mercury conference, which provided a platform for cross-country knowledge sharing towards reducing and eventually eliminating the use of mercury in all sectors.

Desiree Narvaez of the UN Environment Chemicals and Health Branch explained the need for stakeholders to have a platform to address mercury as a global health and environment issue, noting that such platforms are essential for governments to understand the devastating impact of mercury use.

Of the 52 countries, Africa is ahead of every other continent with 19 countries ratifying the Convention.

Anne Lillian Nakafeero from Uganda’s National Environment Management Authority. Credt: Miriam Gathigah/IPS

The Zero Mercury Working Group has major ongoing intervention projects in, for instance, Nigeria and Mauritius, focusing on phasing out mercury added products by 2020 as stipulated in the Minamata Convention.

Other Zero Mercury projects are also in countries such as Ghana and Tanzania where the main focus has been reducing and eventually eliminating the use of mercury in artisanal and small scale gold mining.

These projects are also keen on protecting vulnerable populations, and specifically women and children.

Experts at the conference reiterated the fact that the use of mercury in artisanal and small scale gold mining continues to rise, especially in developing countries, mainly because it is considered simple and inexpensive – producing 20 to 30 percent of the world’s gold.

The Zero Mercury Working Group estimates that 15 million people in approximately 70 countries are employed in artisanal and small scale gold mining, with many exposed to mercury. Four to five million of them are vulnerable women and children.

As a result, there is a need for concerted efforts to protect such disadvantaged populations and for countries to ensure that their respective National Action Plans emphasize the protection of such vulnerable groups when implementing the Convention.

There was significant emphasis during the Nairobi conference on the need for governments to develop and implement the Convention, which contains mandatory obligations to eliminate where feasible, and otherwise minimize, the global supply and trade of mercury.

A key stakeholder during the conference and indeed in global efforts to phase out mercury is the United Nations Environment Global Mercury Partnership (UN Environment).

Within the context of the Minamata Convention the focus of the UN Environment Global Mercury Partnership has shifted to support crucial areas of the treaty.

This includes banning  a number of listed mercury added products by 2020, with the exception of a Party registering an exemption.

Reducing and ultimately eliminating the use of mercury in small scale gold mining is expected to be done progressively, with the objective achieved in about 15 years.

The meeting brought together many government officials and stakeholders in a one-day forum held on the heels of the Zero Mercury conference to develop their own road maps for phasing out mercury under the Minamata Convention by 2020.

This included 35 delegates from 31 countries, representatives of seven United Nations and intergovernmental agencies, 15 NGOs and five other delegates from academics, private sector and consultants.

It emerged from the meetings and experience sharing that there is a great need for country-specific laws to explicitly outlaw the use of mercury in products and taking voluntary steps to significantly reduce mercury in artisanal and small scale gold mining, since the treaty doesn’t specifically ban it.

For example, Uganda has signed the Minamata Convention and is in the process of developing a National Action Plan for reducing mercury in artisanal and small scale gold mining. While this will take this East African nation a step closer towards phasing out mercury, there is no legislation in place outlawing the use of mercury.

“In this regard, stakeholders must embrace as many partnerships as possible. Mercury is a cross-cutting issue and one single entity cannot address this agenda. We need the government, Civil Society Organizations, miners and others as was demonstrated during the Zero Mercury conference,” said Anne Lillian Nakafeero from the National Environment Management Authority in Uganda.

Remediation crews clean up some of the worst contaminated homes in Dong Mai, Vietnam. Credit: Blacksmith Institute for a Pure Earth

By Kitty Stapp
NEW YORK, Jan 27 2015 (IPS)

The village of Dong Mai in Vietnam’s agricultural heartland had a serious problem.

To boost their meager incomes, its residents – former artisans who once produced and sold bronze casts – had taken to cannibalizing old car and truck lead-acid batteries and smelting them by hand in their own backyards. As a result, the 2,600 people living there had some of the highest blood lead levels ever recorded."Concretely: We know how to change the situation because we have done it." -- Stephan Robinson

Dong Mai’s water and soil had become terribly contaminated — 32-36 times higher than the acceptable limits. People were getting sick, including children. One home assessed with an X-ray Florescence (XRF) analyser had lead levels 50 times the higher than the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) standard.

Local government knew of the problem, but the cost of cleaning it up – expected to run into the millions – was daunting. Then, a collaboration with the Blacksmith Institute for a Pure Earth found ways to remediate the lead for much less: about 20 dollars a person.

Once major remedial work was completed, in February 2014, lead levels in the population fell by nearly a third in six months.

“Political will takes time to build,” Rich Fuller, Blacksmith’s president, told IPS. “Governments need solid data on the scope of problems, and how to solve them. Most governments are just starting to build their teams for pollution, and those NGOs that provide support, rather than criticism, have really been a huge help.”

Together with Green Cross Switzerland and the Global Alliance on Health and Pollution (GAHP), the Blacksmith Institute released a report Tuesday highlighting cleanup success stories like Dong Mai’s.

Top Ten Countries Turning the Corner on Toxic Pollution notes that pollution kills more than 8.9 million people around the world each year, most of them children, and the vast majority — 8.4 million — in low- and middle-income countries.

To put that figure in perspective, it is 35 percent more than tobacco-related deaths, almost three times more deaths than malaria and 14 times more deaths than HIV/AIDS.

Women in Senegal didn’t know their toxic jobs were poisoning themselves and their families. Credit: Blacksmith Institute for a Pure Earth

“Contrary to popular belief, many of the worst pollution problems are not caused by multinational companies but by poorly regulated small-scale operations like artisanal mining, small industrial estates or abandoned factories,” Stephan Robinson of Green Cross Switzerland told IPS.

“However, high-income countries are indirectly contributing by their demand for commodities and consumer goods to the issue as many of these small-scale operations produce the raw or precursor products,” he added. “They thus support many of these smaller industries, adding to the severity of pollution problems in low-income countries.”

Lead, the culprit in Dong Mai, is especially devastating for children. It can damage the brain and nervous system, cause developmental delays, and in cases of extreme exposure, result in death. Children also tend to have higher exposures because they play in dirt and put their hands and other objects in their mouths.

The economic toll of pollutants on poor and middle income countries is high: the costs of air pollution alone range between six and 12 percent of GDP.

Previous Blacksmith reports had focused on the 10 worst toxic hotspots, but this year, the groups chose to look at practical, replicable solutions that don’t require a vast amount of resources to implement.

“There is so much to do,” Fuller said. “Only a few countries have started down the path. We wanted to give them credit, and have them be examples for expanding work on pollution in other countries.”

In the case of Dong Mai, mobilising the active participation of villagers and local officials was key.

Instead of removing the contamined soil and carting it off to landfills, the backyards were capped with sand, a layer of geotextiles, 20 centimetres of compacted clean soil, bricks, and finally, concrete on top, safely sealing away the lead.

After an educational campaign, 50 villagers took on the task of remediating their own yards in this way. What could have cost about 10 million dollars was accomplished for 60,000.

“GAHP members are encouraged to help their neighbours,” Fuller said. “Often, a success in one country can translate into a project in another.  This is certainly true of lead poisoning and e-waste. The GAHP model is collaborative between international agencies, and between countries, all helping each other work out how to solve these awful problems.”

The other success stories in the report were led by Ghana, Senegal, Peru, Uruguay, Mexico, Indonesia, Philippines, the Former Soviet Union and Kyrgyzstan.

In Thiaroye Sur Mer, Senegal, lead battery recycling was replaced with profitable hydroponic gardens.

In Mexico City, a contaminated oil refinery was turned into an urban park with one million visitors a year.

In Agbogbloshie, Ghana, informal e-waste recycling by burning electronic scrap that released toxins is now performed safely by machines.

Bicentennial Park is located on the site of a former oil refinery in Azcapotzalco, Mexico. Credit: vladimix, Creative Commons, Some Rights Reserved

“We worked hard to find solutions that would work for the local recyclers,” Kira Traore, Blacksmith’s programme director for Africa, says in the report. “Simply banning burning wouldn’t help them earn an income. Rather, forbidding burning in Agbogbloshie might push the practice elsewhere, thus expanding the pollution and the number of people affected by it.”

Experts note that local sources of pollution – particularly heavy metals like mercury and arsenic – are often very mobile and can have health impacts thousands of kilometres away.

“Mercury from unsafe artisanal gold mining and coal plants travels the globe and is found in our fish which, e.g., we eat as sushi in London,” Robinson said. “DDT (dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane) is found in the body fat of the inhabitants of Greenland, though there was never agriculture in Greenland.

“Contaminated air from China and elsewhere can be measured in other countries. Radionuclides from nuclear disasters, like Chernobyl, have reached other countries in most of Europe,” he noted.

In essence, rich countries have not only a moral obligation but a vested interest in helping poorer nations address pollution.

“Western nations have had success in cleaning up their toxic and legacy pollution over the last 40 years and can transfer technology and know-how to low- and middle-income countries today. Concretely: We know how to change the situation because we have done it,” he said.

“Pollution problems can only be solved by organisations joining forces and bringing in what they are best at…These are stories proving we are on the right track, and moving forward. But we need to do more with industrialisation in full swing around the world.”

Edited by Roger Hamilton-Martin

Artisanal miner panning for gold in Choluteca, Honduras. Small-scale gold mining is a leading cause of mercury pollution. Credit: Thelma Mejía/IPS

By Carey L. Biron
WASHINGTON, Oct 7 2013 (IPS)

A new international convention opening for signatures this week will for the first time offer an agreed-upon roadmap by which to significantly decrease the global use of mercury while offering stronger safeguards for both human health and the environment.

Environment and public health groups are hailing the treaty, a legally binding agreement known as the Minamata Convention on Mercury, the text of which was agreed to in January by 147 countries following four years of negotiations. Proponents are now calling on governments to move quickly to ratify the accord after it opens for signatures, on Wednesday during a four-day summit in Japan.“This is something we’ve worked on for over a decade, so it’s quite an amazing moment." -- Michael Bender of the Zero Mercury Working Group

The convention will come into effect following ratification by 50 countries, though several key parts of the agreement will only be enforced at the end of this decade or even later.

“Overall, this is a really positive step – while we would have liked to have seen a stronger section on health, just having health language in what was considered an environmental treaty is an achievement,” Jane Cohen, a researcher in the Health and Human Rights Division at Human Rights Watch, an advocacy group, told IPS.

“We see mercury exposure in this setting as a critical threat to children’s and women’s health, as well as a major issue around access to information. It’s a prime example of environmental degradation impacting directly on human lives.”

The Minamata Convention (named for the Japanese city that is the site of the worst modern mercury poisoning) will now lead ratifying countries to phase out – and, by 2020, to ban – the use of mercury in a range of consumer items, including certain batteries, light bulbs, medical devices, dental fillings and vaccines. It will also tackle mercury pollution at its two most common sources, small-scale gold mining and coal-fired power plants.

Indeed, it is due to these latter two sectors that the new convention’s effects will likely be particularly pronounced in developing countries. While most industrialised countries have reduced their use of mercury in recent decades, developing economies have seen a steep rise in the toxic metal’s use.

“This is the first time we’ve seen these kinds of protections in a convention, so in addition to requiring real, implementable steps, it also brings much-needed attention to this issue for governments,” Cohen notes.

“Any country that has small-scale gold mining must now have a national action plan to look at alternatives or ensure worker and environmental safety – countries won’t be able to just ignore this convention. In addition, some of the worst forms of this sector’s use of mercury – such as burning it – will be banned outright.”

According to estimates released earlier this year by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), since 2005 mercury emissions have doubled in small-scale mining operations in Africa, Asia and South America. Today, Southeast and East Asia alone account for around half of global mercury emissions, put down to the regions’ rapid economic growth in recent years and rising gold prices.

No alternative to cooperation

International talks on the dangers posed by mercury began in earnest early last decade, and by 2003 countries had struck an initial agreement that the substance deserved to be considered a global pollutant warranting immediate international action. But it took another half-dozen years for serious negotiations, a process that was given new momentum by President Barack Obama’s election in 2008.

As a senator, Obama had urged the U.S. government to enter into negotiations towards a binding international mercury standard. After his election to the presidency, Obama was able to oversee an about-face in U.S. policy on the issue, a change that proved to be a catalyst for other countries, including China and India.

Simultaneously, many industrialised countries were already ratcheting down their own use of mercury, both for consumer and industrial purposes. In late 2011, the U.S. government unveiled strict new standards for mercury emissions from power plants, seen as one of the most important environmental victories of Obama’s first term.

“This is one of the compelling reasons why countries like the United States and other developed countries have moved to adopt the treaty, because they’ve already taken significant steps to phase out their use of mercury,” Michael Bender, a founder and international coordinator for the Zero Mercury Working Group (ZMWG), a network of groups in 50 countries, told IPS from the sidelines of the Japan summit.

“This is something we’ve worked on for over a decade, so it’s quite an amazing moment. No single country can solve the global mercury crisis – while there are alternatives to most products and processes and there are controls for most major sources, there is no alternative to global cooperation.”

Mercury, which can remain in natural environments for years, attacks the nervous system and has been proven to be particularly debilitating for unborn babies and children. According to new research released last week by the ZMWG, mercury levels in many human communities could be far higher than anticipated.

Looking at hair samples of women of childbearing age from nine countries, researchers found that nearly a quarter exceeded a widely accepted safety limit for a certain type of mercury set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Further, higher findings appear to correlate with higher consumption of fish and seafood, with 71 percent of women in Japan, for instance, exceeding this limit, followed by 64 percent of women in Spain.

While Bender expresses satisfaction with the Minamata Convention’s imminent passage, he and others have expressed concern over the agreement’s timeframe.

A new article he co-authored for the Journal of Public Health Policy warns that the convention “is slow to address major sources and uses of mercury. Coal-fired power plants constructed after the Convention enters into force are not required to install controls until 5 years later, with existing facilities given 10 years … Moreover, missing from the Convention are steps to eventually end mercury use in” small-scale gold mining.

Still, Bender and the ZMWG are now turning their attention to encouraging the convention’s timely ratification. They’re hoping to get the required 50 ratifications by 2015, and Bender says he’s optimistic that goal will be met.

“One good indication is the great number of environment ministers showing up here [in Japan], a dozen and a half from Africa alone,” he says.

“We also understand that a significant percentage of countries in the European Union are coming. Between the interest being demonstrated in Africa and the E.U. alone, we feel quite confident that the momentum for this international agreement will continue to build.”

A child at a lead-contaminated site. Credit: Blacksmith Institute

By Stephen Leahy
UXBRIDGE, Canada, May 9 2013 (IPS)

Toxic waste sites in 31 countries are damaging the brains of nearly 800,000 children and impairing the health of millions of people in the developing world, two new studies have found.

Toxins and pollutants in the environment are major sources of illness and reduced lifespans globally. The impacts on health in some countries are on par with malaria, said Kevin Chatham-Stephens, a pediatric environmental health fellow at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai."We have found lots of nasty sites out there but we don't have the money to clean them up." -- Bret Ericson of the Blacksmith Institute

“We were surprised that health impacts of living near toxic sites were on par with other well-known threats to public health such as malaria,” Chatham-Stephens told IPS.

In one study researchers found elevated levels of lead, chromium and other chemicals in soil and water samples near 373 toxic waste sites located in India, the Philippines and Indonesia. Nearly nine million people live near these sites and researchers calculated that the likely impact from diseases caused by exposure to these chemicals amounted to 828,722 lost years due to ill-health, disability or early death.

Malaria in the same countries caused 725,000 lost years of full health.

The “lost year” metric is known as disability-adjusted life years (DALY), a measure of overall disease burden used by the World Health Organisation. One DALY represents the loss of one year of equivalent full health.

“Lead and hexavalent chromium proved to be the most toxic chemicals and caused the majority of disease, disability and mortality among the individuals living near the sites,” said Chatham-Stephens, co-author of the study published this week in Environmental Health Perspectives.

The study was done in partnership with the Blacksmith Institute, a small international NGO based in New York City investigating the health risks of toxic sites in low and middle income countries. Blacksmith publishes the annual “World’s Worst Pollution Problems Report” to raise awareness and funding to help clean-up the worst sites.

Toxic sites “fly under the radar” in terms of public health awareness and action. Little research has been done on the health impacts of chemical pollutants in developing countries.

“This is the first estimate of the burden of disease resulting from living near toxic waste sites,” said Chatham-Stephens.

Previous studies have shown that lead can cause neurological, gastrointestinal and cardiovascular damage. Exposure to high levels of chromium has been shown to increase chances of developing lung cancer.

“This study highlights a major and previously under-recognised global health problem in lower and middle income countries,” said Philip Landrigan, MD, MSc, dean for Global Health at the Icahn School of Medicine and a co-author.

“The next step is targeting interventions such as cleaning up the sites and minimising the exposure of humans in each of these countries where toxic chemicals are greatly present,” said Landrigan.

In a second study, researchers measured lead levels in soil and drinking water at 200 toxic waste sites in 31 countries, then estimated the blood lead levels in 779,989 children who were potentially exposed to lead from those sites. They found that their blood lead levels were likely very high, 15 to 20 times higher on average than children in the U.S.

“Lead has serious, long-term health consequences such as the potential to impair cognitive development in children and cause mental retardation,” said Chatham-Stephens.

Based on these findings, Chatham-Stephens estimates a loss of five to eight IQ points per child and an incidence of mild mental retardation in six out of every 1,000 children.

Increased cardiovascular disease is another impact from lead exposure but wasn’t part of the study. “We couldn’t account for every health impact,” he said. “We hope these studies raise awareness and result in on-site disease surveillance, including measurements of blood lead levels in children.”

Given the very high levels of toxins at some sites, targeted clean-up is also an urgent issue, he said.

“(Toxic sites) are a major public health problem that is hiding in plain sight,” Bret Ericson of the Blacksmith Institute previously told IPS.

“We have found lots of nasty sites out there but we don’t have the money to clean them up,” Ericson said.

By Gustavo Capdevila
GENEVA, Jan 21 2013 (IPS)

The international community has adopted a binding treaty for reducing emissions of mercury, a poisonous heavy metal that harms human health and the ecosystems on which life depends.

Uruguayan diplomat Fernando Lugris chairing the Minamata Convention on Mercury negotiations. Credit: Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores de Uruguay

The Minamata Convention on Mercury, which sets out to control and reduce products and processes using the metal, was approved on Saturday Jan. 19 by representatives of over 140 governments. It will be signed in Japan in September and will enter into force once 50 countries or more have ratified it.

Mercury is a neurotoxin affecting the central nervous system and the brain. It also damages the kidneys and other body systems such as the respiratory, gastrointestinal, haematological, immunological and reproductive systems.

The provisions of the treaty agreed in Geneva prohibit production, export and import of some products containing mercury with effect from 2020, including certain types of batteries, fluorescent lamps, soaps and cosmetics, and non-electronic medical instruments like thermometers and blood pressure monitors.

The convention does not ban elements for which mercury-free substitutes are so far not available, like vaccines where mercury is used for preservation, and uses of mercury in religious or traditional activities.

The negotiations for the Minamata Convention on Mercury, named after a city in Japan where serious health and environmental damage occurred as a result of mercury pollution in the 20th century, were chaired by Uruguayan diplomat Fernando Lugris, backed by United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Executive Director Achim Steiner and UNEP experts.

In an interview following the adoption of the treaty, Lugris, who brought four years of negotiations to a successful conclusion, told IPS he was very satisfied by the agreement.

Q: How would you sum up the progress that has been made?

A: I think we have reached a high level of ambition in which regulatory measures, especially to limit mercury emissions (in) to the air, soil and water, are really ambitious. We will be able to achieve very significant global reductions.

Q: What kinds of emissions are specified in the text?

A: The treaty does not seek to reduce natural emissions, because mercury is an element that exists naturally on our planet. Instead, we are trying to limit anthropogenic emissions generated by the use of mercury in man-made products or processes, and we are seeking substitutes to replace it.

Q: Will the convention affect countries’ economic situations?

A: Basically, the treaty seeks not to impose limits on (individual countries’ economic) development, but to orient them towards sustainable development so that, in the future, processes and products will be free of mercury; that is, we seek sustainable substitutes for it.

Q: Representatives of NGOs have criticised the text of the treaty. In their view the measures do not go far enough to reduce global emissions of mercury, and might even produce an increase in mercury pollution.

A: I believe civil society has to raise its voice and demand that governments make greater efforts, and this convention is an important starting point. Yesterday, there was no binding treaty for the international community. Now we have one.

However, this effort could be strengthened by future actions, through the evolution of the convention itself at the conferences of its parties.

Q: During the negotiations, did you have difficulties with the North-South division that is a feature of most multilateral debates?

A: For some issues, the North-South divide continues to exist. However, in other aspects, we perceive the world is already changing. Atmospheric emissions are a clear example, where countries like China and India are the biggest emitters because of their use of coal-fired power plants (the top source of mercury emissions).

But the United States and the European Union are big emitters too. And it was very clear that in the discussions over air pollution reduction, the negotiated package gradually took shape between the big polluters.

Q: Were you aware of any other grouping of countries during the negotiations?

A: Yes. In discussing release of mercury into water, we found the developing countries, especially in Africa and Latin America, had clearly similar realities, and their greatest need is to seek cooperation and to help vulnerable populations.

Q: How did the group of countries from Latin America and the Caribbean fare with their initiative on health?

A: The GRULAC (Latin American and Caribbean Group) clearly sought to introduce health as an issue throughout the convention, and the agreed text basically contains many measures for health protection.

The group also insisted on the need to include a specific article on health. In principle, the industrialised countries felt that an article on health was irrelevant in an environmental agreement.

However, Latin America’s persistence and its clear interest in protecting human health succeeded in getting the final session of the plenary to agree on an article specifically about health.

Q: Does the approved text provide for funding for the protection of human health?

A: As the convention will have a financing body to support its implementation, clearly the measures taken will have a positive effect on the protection of human health.

Above all it should be underlined that human health, in relation to mercury pollution, is not protected solely through the enforcement of specific measures to that end, but control of atmospheric emissions (in general) is the most important action to preserve human life.

Q: At the last minute countries like Canada, France and the United Kingdom rejected a proposal from Bolivia to include a reference to indigenous populations in the text. How did that debate go?

A: The international community has clearly formulated this issue through the (U.N.) Declaration on (the Rights of) Indigenous Peoples, which is a non-binding agreement, but unfortunately at the level of binding agreements there are still some countries that oppose making specific reference to native peoples . This is not the case in Latin America.

Q: What is your opinion on this?

A: Latin America supports the declaration on indigenous peoples and makes clear reference to the collective rights that were recognised in this declaration, which was in fact adopted in Geneva, having been introduced in the General Assembly session by the representatives of Peru, with the support of Uruguay.

Excerpt:

The Coatzacoalcos river basin in southern Mexico is so polluted that you can sense the mercury in the air, feel it and breathe it, and the population living in the area is only too aware of its undesirable neighbours: refineries and petrochemical complexes that emit this toxic element into the air and water.

“People are concerned about the situation and want solutions. We are talking to the communities in order to take strong action,” activist Isaúl Rodríguez, head of the Tatexco Ecological Producers Association (APETAT), told IPS from the affected area.

This NGO has some 2,500 members whose livelihoods are affected by their location close to the petrochemical plants and refineries established in the basin, in the southeastern state of Veracruz.

Their plight illustrates the problems associated with emission and management of mercury faced by Mexico, just as the fifth and final round of negotiations for an International Treaty on Mercury is being held Jan. 14-18 in Geneva. This will be the first legally binding global treaty to limit mercury emissions.

A study released on Jan. 9 about the petrochemical industry in the Coatzacoalcos river basin, which has implications in the context of ongoing international treaty negotiations, was eloquent in stating reasons for concern.

The average mercury level in the samples of human hair from the Coatzacoalcos basin was 1.7 times the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) reference dose of one part per million.

The results “make us worry about the problem we face. People wonder whether they are going to die, or what will happen if they seek medical treatment. It’s a difficult social and economic problem,” Lorenzo Bozada, head of Ecología y Desarrollo Sostenible en Coatzacoalcos (Ecology and Sustainable Development in Coatzacoalcos), an NGO, told IPS.

Bozada took part in taking samples and writing the research report, together with two other independent organisations: the Mexican Centre for Analysis and Action on Toxins and their Alternatives (CAATA) and the Arnika Association of the Czech Republic.

The report is part of the Global Fish and Community Mercury Monitoring Project, coordinated by the International Persistent Organic Pollutants Elimination Network (IPEN) and the U.S. Biodiversity Research Institute (BRI).

The study covered 25 municipalities, with a population of close to two million people and economic activities that include fishing, livestock raising and cultivating maize, squash and fruit.

The state General Lázaro Cárdenas refinery, which processes 285,000 barrels per day (bpd) of crude oil, is located at Minatitlán, on the banks of the Coatzacoalcos river, while in the nearby city of Coatzacoalcos, on the same river, is the state Pajaritos petrochemical complex, in whose grounds a private chlor-alkali plant operates, using mercury in its manufacturing process.

Exposure to mercury, which is naturally present in air, soil and water, can harm the nervous, immune and digestive systems, the skin, lungs, kidneys and eyes. It is also harmful to foetal neurological development.

Bacteria and other microorganisms convert mercury to methylmercury, which can accumulate in the food chain, especially in fish.

The toxic element enters soil and water through the use of fertilisers, small scale artisanal gold mining, the use of mercury thermometers, and energy saving light bulbs.

The case of the Coatzacoalcos river basin does not appear to be unique in the country, although there are not enough data to be sure.

A 2012 study, “Patterns of Global Seafood Mercury Concentrations and their Relationship with Human Health,” conducted by David Evers, Madeline Turnquist and David Bucks, all researchers at the BRI, indicates that the highest mercury concentrations are found in the Gulfs of California and Mexico, on the border with the United States.

“Mexico’s policies are inadequate. There is a need for a more systematic programme on the presence of mercury at the national level, and for more work on critical areas, like this river basin,” the head of CAATA, Fernando Bejarano, told IPS before travelling to Geneva for the final negotiations of the treaty, which has been promoted since 2009 by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

Mercury Watch, an international alliance, says that small scale artisanal gold mining emitted 7.5 tonnes of mercury in Mexico in 2010, when the country exported 134.24 tonnes of mercury and imported 13.89 tonnes, almost all from the United States.

The Mexican Mercury Market Report for 2011, prepared by José Castro for the Commission for Environmental Cooperation of North America, estimates there are nearly 27 million tonnes of mercury waste, accumulated in mines and the chlor-alkali industry.

Trade in mercury is a challenge for Mexico because the European Union has banned exports since 2011, while the United States has prohibited exports of elemental mercury effective Jan. 1, 2013, making it difficult for Mexico to acquire the metal.

Mexican policy has focused on studying domestic issues related to mercury and withdrawing its use from hospitals, as shown in the letter sent to the UNEP in August 2010, when Mexico joined the Mercury Products Partnership. But it does not address recycling.

In another letter sent on Aug. 31 by the Directorate General for Global Issues of the Office of the Undersecretary for Multilateral Affairs and Human Rights, to the UNEP Division of Technology, Industry and Economics, the Mexican government stated that the minimum limits for reporting emissions and transfers of mercury and its compounds are one and five kilogrammes a year, respectively.

“PEMEX (the Mexican state oil company) must take responsibility for reducing and monitoring mercury emissions, and it has a historic environmental debt towards the people who live in this region. The Health Secretariat (ministry) should carry out a clinical and epidemiological assessment of the impacts and take steps to reduce exposure,” Bozada said.

The IPEN network is critical of the draft treaty on the table because it does not demand clean-up of contaminated sites, payment for bio-remediation or compensation for accident victims. It also absolves the oil and gas sector of responsibilities.

“Mexico should achieve a higher commitment in these sectors,” said CAATA’s Bejarano about the treaty, which, if all goes as planned, will be signed in October by the 128 states participating in the negotiations.

But for producers like Rodríguez, the head of APETAT, the treaty is a pipe dream and there are few other options. “To begin with (there) could be a ban fishing, so that fishers are not exposed to mercury, and then it is essential that the polluting companies help the people,” he said.

(END)

In one recent study, 84 percent of fish sampled at sites located near potential mercury contamination were not safe for consumption for more than one meal per month. Credit: Jeremy Keith/cc by 2.0

By Carey L. Biron
WASHINGTON, Jan 10 2013 (IPS)

Even as government negotiators from around the world prepare to gather next week for a final round of talks on a new international treaty limiting the use of mercury, scientists and activists are warning that the draft treaty is both too weak and too limited in scope to have a major impact.

“Based on what’s happened so far, based on the draft text, we have strong doubts that the treaty will actually be sufficient to reduce global levels of mercury in fish and seafood,” Joe DiGangi, a science and policy advisor for IPEN, an anti-toxics network, told IPS from Geneva, where negotiations will take place Jan. 13-18.

“You have a disconnect between the severity of the problem and the political will in the actual details of the treaty,” he said.

While most industrialised countries have reduced their use of mercury in recent decades, developing countries have seen a steep rise in the toxic metal’s use, primarily from the burning of coal and as an important agent in small-scale gold mining.

Mercury, which can remain in natural environments for years, attacks the nervous system and has been proven to be particularly debilitating for unborn babies and children.

According to a new report released Thursday by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), since 2005 mercury emissions have doubled in small-scale mining operations in Africa, Asia and South America. Today, Southeast and East Asia alone account for around half of global mercury emissions, put down to the regions’ rapid economic growth in recent years.

“The burden of disease in many ways is shifting towards developing countries,” Achim Steiner, the UNEP executive director, wrote in introducing the new study.

Noting that the report “speaks directly to governments involved in the development of the global treaty on mercury”, he reminds negotiators that the World Health Organisation “has concluded there are no safe limits in respect to mercury”.

Invisible epidemic

Under the auspices of the UNEP, next week over 100 countries will meet in Geneva for a fifth and final round of discussion toward an agreement that would offer a variety of guidance on mercury use, as well as aim to reduce demand for the metal by 2015.

Yet according to some observers, the negotiations and drafts that have emerged from this process have become so watered down that the overall treaty risks becoming largely ineffectual, lacking the holistic vision needed.

For instance, IPEN’s DiGangi says, while the draft treaty acknowledges that small-scale gold mining is one of the largest sources of mercury contamination, it also makes cleaning up contaminated sites completely voluntary.

Likewise, while “vague” requirements may be set for airborne mercury at coal-fired power plants, the treaty has nothing to say about the thousands of new coal plants currently being planned for construction around the world.

DiGangi was a lead scientist on a recent international study that studied mercury levels in fish and human hair at sites located near potential mercury contamination. He says that the results, which were released on Wednesday, “were a surprise to all of us because the levels found were so high in so many developing countries.”

For instance, 84 percent of fish sampled were not safe for consumption for more than one meal per month, under U.S. regulation. Likewise, more than 82 percent of the people studied contained mercury exceeding current health advisory levels.

“That’s serious – that’s the sort of problem that calls for an ambitious and robust response,” DiGangi says. “In many developing countries, even if they have rules on mercury use, enforcement is a common problem, as is simple information on these hazards. For many of these communities, this was the first time that fish and humans were examined.”

After the results came out, he adds, many of those who had been tested were surprised – and “many wanted the sources to be addressed in rigorous way.”

Failing Minamata

Despite the undisputed international consensus on the hazards of mercury to human health, negotiations towards the new treaty have focused on environmental rather than health concerns.

“Initially, there was virtually nothing on health, though there’s been some advances, particularly because the Latin American and some African countries have advocated for a stronger section on health and a more explicit focus on health rights,” Joseph Amon, a U.S.-based health researcher with Human Rights Watch, a watchdog, told IPS.

“This could have been a simple oversight, or it could be a way to avoid some responsibility. Traditional donor governments have been resistant to explicit language around health because of reduced budgets in international health, while other countries have been resistant because they have significant gold-mining operations.”

Amon particularly highlights the United States, European Union and Canada for having taken regressive stances on the explicit incorporation of health concerns into the draft negotiations, including having rejected a separate section on health in the new treaty during the last round of talks, in 2012.

“These are countries that support global health generally, so the restrictive arguments that are being put forth by these three just don’t hold up,” he says.

Frustration over the treaty’s tepidness has even impacted on decisions on what any eventual agreement should be named. Originally, it was to be dubbed the Minamata Convention, after the Japanese city that, during the 1950s, was the scene of one of the world’s worst mercury poisonings, killing 1,700 people and impacting on many more.

“This treaty needs to do three things: honour the Minamata victims, prevent future Minamata-type disasters, and ensure a good response to any such incident in the future,” DiGangi says.

“Because the new treaty does not look to be sufficiently robust to justify this name, we are advocating for a different name – as are citizen groups of survivors of Minamata and the Minamata city council.”

A small-scale gold miner shows off his earnings for the day. Credit: chuck624/cc by 2.0

By Bert Wilkinson
GEORGETOWN, Guyana, Nov 26 2012 (IPS)

As regional delegates meet to discuss a legally binding ban on the use of mercury this week, Guyanese officials are arguing that an exception should be made for the South American country’s lucrative gold mining sector until an acceptable alternative is found.

Since world gold prices began to surge in the last five-plus years, gold has become Guyana’s leading export industry, easily surpassing sugar, bauxite and rice as the main economic pillar.

The runaway prices have also attracted hundreds of millions of dollars in investments by Canadian, U.S., Australian, Russian, Chinese and Brazilian firms, all eager to open huge mines in the country that colonial-era British explorer Sir Walter Raleigh once believed was home to the legendary “El Dorado”.

The plan to lobby for a grace period to comply with anticipated treaty restrictions on the use of mercury to recover gold is to be pitched at the Nov. 26-29 U.N. Environment Programme (UNEP) review conference in Bogota, Colombia, where government officials, industry players and activists will gather to debate the issue in-depth.

Small-scale miners add mercury to pans of gold-rich ore, where the element clings to the gold and sinks to the bottom. Studies show that up to 15 million miners around the world are exposed to dangerous levels of mercury in this way, along with others in the industry like jungle shopkeepers and jewelers.

It is also a major environmental hazard, travelling thousands of miles in the atmosphere and poisoning local water sources.

This year, recorded sales of gold will bring in more than 600 million dollars to the Guyanese economy, about six times more than sugar. Officials say about half of the estimated national annual production of about 650,000 troy ounces is smuggled to countries like neighbouring Suriname and Brazil where royalties and taxes are cheaper.

Natural Resources Minister Roper Persaud has included active miners and mercury suppliers in his delegation. He says he plans “to vigorously tell the meeting that up to 100,000 people depend on the sector for a living and so the status quo must remain until an equally efficient way of trapping gold from mud, sand or alluvial rock is arrived at.”

“We import large quantities of mercury in Guyana but mercury is not abused here,” Miners Association spokesman Tony Shields told IPS. “We use far less than, for example, the Brazilians and miners in other countries, but the industry will die unless we get the grace period and until a satisfactory alternative is found to the use of mercury.”

Shields argues that if uncertainty about restrictions or an outright ban is not dealt with quickly, miners will simply hoard mercury supplies. Most remain convinced that mercury is the best method despite its known negative effects on human health and the environment.

A recent study by the Guianas office of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) found elevated levels of mercury not only in miners who use it almost daily while panning for gold, but in jewelers who inhale the dust when working with raw gold and in jungle shopkeepers who often barter for gold, a revelation that caught most in the industry and environmental community off-guard.

Critics note that the Guyanese government has been hard-pressed to control the industry’s spectacular growth, which has brought increased lawlessness – including a spike in the annual murder rate from about 10 to 50 a year – and more importantly, pollution of waterways and general damage to the environment.

As an indication of how serious the situation is, the umbrella Amerindian People’s Association (APA), which monitors the situation of nine native tribes in the jungle, says it is overwhelmed by daily complaints from members about rivers being so polluted that animals no longer water at them.

Residents say they now have to trek to faraway creeks that are hopefully less polluted to get potable water, fish and wait for animals to trap, as dirty and dying waterways are chasing them away.

“The situation is a serious one but nothing much is being done to alleviate it,” APA spokeswoman Jean LaRose told IPS.

The mines commission and the WWF have collaborated in recent months to demonstrate alternative equipment like the shaking tables and a retort system that hardly uses mercury, but miners’ representatives like Shields, as well as government officials, argue that mercury is still the most efficient method.

Meanwhile, several large Canadian companies are at an advanced stage of exploration and will soon be going into full production on large-scale mines in the malaria-infested interior of the Amazon. They will likely use cyanide, whose effects are also known to be harmful to the environment.