After my post last night about American companies using minerals from the Congo which supports a genocidal conflict there, some of you asked what you could do to help stop the trade in conflicts minerals that has led to millions of deaths in Congo, war crimes, rape, slavery and the spread of STDs in Africa. Well I did some more research today, and here’s some more information and ideas on what you can do along with some added information about the inadequate response of the Electronics Industry to this problem and the need to make this a foreign policy priority of the Obama administration.
Follow me below the fold, please:
So, What can you do to stop this trade?
Here’s some ideas from yesterday’s Kristof article:
The Obama administration also should put more pressure on Rwanda to play a constructive role next door in Congo (it has, inexcusably, backed one militia and bolstered others by dealing extensively in the conflict minerals trade). Impeding trade in conflict minerals is also a piece of the Congo puzzle, and because of public pressure, a group of companies led by Intel and Motorola is now developing a process to audit origins of tantalum in supply chains.
Manufacturers previously settled for statements from suppliers that they do not source in eastern Congo, with no verification. Auditing the supply chains at smelters to determine whether minerals are clean or bloody would add about a penny to the price of a cellphone, according to the Enough Project, which says the figure originated with the industry.
“Apple is claiming that their products don’t contain conflict minerals because their suppliers say so,” said Jonathan Hutson, of the Enough Project. “People are saying that answer is not good enough. That’s why there’s this grass-roots movement, so that we as consumers can choose to buy conflict free.” Some ideas about what consumers can do are at raisehopeforCongo.org — starting with spreading the word.
Again, the website for RAISE Hope for Congo is HERE
Here’s an email exchange with Steve Jobs posted at that website (via WIRED magazine):
WIRED’s Gadget Lab blog just published a post highlighting the first-ever direct response from the Apple founder about conflict minerals, a problem that plagues every electronics company and thus links consumers to the war in Congo – if unwittingly.
Here’s the exchange between Apple loyalist Derick Rhodes and Jobs, as reported by WIRED:
Hi Steve,
I’d planned to buy a new iPhone tomorrow – my first upgrade since buying the very first version on the first day of its release – but I’m hesitant without knowing Apple’s position on sourcing the minerals in its products.
Are you currently making any effort to source conflict-free minerals? In particular, I’m concerned that Apple is getting tantalum, tungsten, tin, and gold from Eastern Congo through its suppliers.
Looking forward to your response,
Derick
Jobs’ reply:
Yes. We require all of our suppliers to certify in writing that they use conflict few [sic] materials. But honestly there is no way for them to be sure. Until someone invents a way to chemically trace minerals from the source mine, it’s a very difficult problem.
Sent from my iPhone
It’s a very welcome development that Jobs decided to personally weigh in on this issue and respond to a concerned consumer, because ultimately it will be decisions by him and other industry leaders that will give customers the choice to go conflict free. But because we have a couple of questions with his argument, Enough is replying in kind. Here’s an email we just sent to him:
Thanks, Steve. You have always blazed a path where others thought it impossible.
Tracing minerals isn’t easy, but it can be done. The chokepoint is at the smelter, where the raw mineral ores are processed into metals. Tin and tantalum firms that supply electronics companies have started tracing programs in the past six months, and certain electronics companies are beginning to audit this process.
But to guarantee to consumers that iPads, iPods and iPhones are verifiably conflict-free, we need more resources and commitment from industry leaders like you. We have a roadmap to accomplish this, through tracing, auditing, and certification. Would you like to meet and talk further?
As anyone can tell, Jobs’ answer is grossly inadequate.
I suggest you contact your favorite electronics’ manufacturers (I will with Dell) and ask them to do more than just accept letters from their suppliers regarding conflicts minerals from the Congo, letters which are often worthless buts of paper designed only to evade legal responsibility. Tell them to get on board with a serious effort to audit the source of the minerals they use to produce the electronic gadgets we all love. I don’t want to be supporting a war that has killed millions and neither should you.
Use the email above as a model or call their customer relations departments directly.
Be polite, but firm. Let them know that you don’t want to support the deaths of millions of our fellow human beings, even indirectly, and neither should they. Give them the website to RAISE Hope For Congo. Tell them a penny additional cost to audit the sources of these minerals is a small price to pay.
Also contact the US State Department at 202-647-4000
Ask to speak to someone in the Bureau of African Affairs to register your concern about what the United States is doing to stop the trade in Conflicts Minerals in the Congo.
Point then to the columns by Kristoff and other articles such asthis article:
Even though the Enough Project, an anti-genocide activist group, estimates that only a fifth of the world’s tantalum comes from Congo, they consider the gadget industry “one of the drivers of the conflict.”
Companies like Intel, Apple, and Motorola have pledged to audit their supply chains more carefully and to remove the so-called “conflict mineral” sources, but Enough Project representatives insist that most of the impetus to clean things up is being placed on the companies’ suppliers and warn that tech companies can’t be content to take suppliers at their word. Intel has been pressured on its Facebook page to support legislation that would reduce trade in conflict minerals, and the Enough Project recently produced a “Get a Mac” spoof that seeks to spread awareness about the issue, condemning both Macs and PCs for using conflict minerals.
It’s clear that these supply chains need to be overhauled—something that hasn’t gone ignored by the companies who rely on them. And while it’s naive to think that manufacturing gadgets with conflict-free tantalum would immediately end Congo’s plight, understanding the realities of where these supply chains begin is a necessary step toward truly cleaning them up.
And this one, too:
Heavy-weights of the computer and electronic industries have joined forces to rid their supply-chains from “blood minerals” coming from the Congo’s militarized mines.
They are supporting “Phase 2” of the initiative developed by the tin industry organization International Tin Research Institute – ITRI, to address the problem of minerals, mainly tin and tantalum, coming from militarized mines in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Militarized mining has meant massive use of forced labor, widespread violence against workers and the population in general, continued abuses of human rights, and unending war.
ITRI says that “Phase 1”, implemented in July 2009, was “a comprehensive due diligence plan for tin minerals exported from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).” It has now announced “Phase 2” of its policy, called ITRI Tin Supply Chain Initiative, iTSCi.
iTSCi would represent:
the first practical field trial designed to address concerns over ‘conflict minerals’ from that region and has required significant commitment and funding, around US$600k, to be put in place in order to go ahead.
[…]
I have also contacted Annie Dunnebacke at Global Witness, an NGO that investigates and campaigns to prevent natural resource-related conflict and corruption. I wanted to know what she had seen in the region, on her last field trip last February, and how that related to the industry’s initiatives.
She told me that GW’s team>
gathered documentary evidence (…) that some comptoirs [trading houses] implementing the ITRI scheme are currently sourcing from militarised zones. Our recent investigation also highlighted that the national army (mostly brigades commanded by former CNDP [Congrès National pour la Défense du Peuple] rebels) have taken over the majority of the mining sites in eastern Congo (with the exception of gold, much of which remains under FDLR [Forces Démocratiques de Libération du Rwanda] control
This means, according to her view, that Phase 1 was only about
ensuring that comptoirs have their paperwork in order – licences, taxes, things they should have been doing by law anyway. It is not an accomplishment, it does not address the conflict minerals problem in any way and is merely belated compliance with basic elements of Congo’s laws.
However, other situations in which illegally extracted natural resources enter the supply-chain of large global corporations showed that compliance with the law is a prerequisite to any successful attempt at banning such products from regular markets.
Annie Dunnebacke’s stronger point is that if
the ITRI scheme does not cover the army – so it does not address the heart of the problem.
She also argues that
companies that source minerals from eastern DRC have a responsibility to make sure their supply chains are free of all materials from militarised mines right now, not at some point in the future. The violence associated with militarised mineral trade is not a future prospect, it is immediate and is costing lives. Any scheme that does not include regular field investigations and independent audits by companies is meaningless.
Seriously, the electronics industry believes $600,000 is an adequate response to stop this horrific trade? It’s window dressing and they know it. The NGO Global Watch has already shown that these efforts are inadequate and merely a cheap cover for their continued trade in conflict minerals which invariably end up supporting the criminals who are engaging in slavery, rape and war. It’s a public relations effort to forestall serious efforts to deal with this issue.
Tell the State Department that they need to sit down with the electronics manufacturers and come up with a real strategy to end the use of conflicts minerals from the Congo. Tell them 6.9 million deaths and human rights violations as this scale is more than enough reason to end our official indifference to the plight of the people in the Congo. We don’t need to send in the troops but we can and should find ways to end the easy export of these minerals and their use in our electronic devices.
Lastly, call your Congressional representatives and demand they take action to end this murderous trade in which war criminals fund their armies and militias through selling the minerals used in our computers and cell phones. Tell them we need laws with stiff fines for any companies caught using conflict minerals, whether or not they can claim they didn’t know where the minerals cane from.
In short, do what this community does best: become a voice for those who have no voice. It doesn’t require your money, but it does require a little time and effort. And if you do have money tom support this cause, send it to:
RAISE Hope For Congo to support it’s Enough campaign.
Thank you.
