IS THERE BLOOD
IN YOUR PHONE?
Here's something to boggle the mind: the Democratic Republic of Congo's mineral resources are estimated at $24tn USD. This is more than the combined GDP of Europe and America! You read that right.
Unfortunately, right now, the ones benefiting the most from those mineral resources are companies who manufacture mobile phones, laptops, mp3 players and games consoles, and the militia groups who control some of the mines and who've been fighting each other in eastern Congo for over a decade.
The main part of minerals used to produce cell phones (and laptops, mp3 players, etc.) come from the mines in the eastern Congo. The western world buys these minerals, thereby partially funding the conflict, and uses them in the manufacture of phones which are them sold all over the world.
The minerals aren't the cause of the conflict, but because the militia groups are connected to most of the mines — according to Dominique Bibaka, the director of Strong Roots, an environmental charity that works with miners to improve their conditions, 98% of east Congo's mines have some involvement with one militia or another — their sale is fuelling the conflict.
If you ask the phone companies where their suppliers get minerals from, not one of them can guarantee that they aren’t buying conflict minerals from the Congo (see Jobs: "No way to be sure" iPhone minerals are conflict-free). Thus, you and me and everyone we know with a mobile phone is potentially implicated. But if our connection to the conflict is inadvertent, what about the mobile phone companies? Do they really not know or do they just not want to know because their profits would be significantly affected if they made the connection and had to act on it?This is part of what director Frank Piasecki Poulsen set out to find out, the result of which is Blood in the Mobile, a documentary that has just gone on general release in the UK, America and Canada, after picking up a bunch of awards on the festival circuit. (Screening schedule here and here; US residents can also watch it online here; and if it's not screening anywhere near you, you can buy the DVD).
After visiting the mines, Poulsen tries to get Nokia, the world's largest phone company, to give him a guarantee that they are not buying conflict minerals. They can't.
SO WHAT NOW?
Here's where it gets complicated: since we all, with our mobile phones, have no idea one way or the other if our particular phone (or laptop, mp3 player, or games console) contains conflict minerals, what are we to do? Stop using mobile phones altogether? Do a Google search for conflict-free phones and you'll find articles like the one you're reading right now, but you won't find any actual products. There's a Dutch initiative to create the world's first fair mobile phone, the FairPhone, but it's still at the prototype development stage. We hope it looks pretty decent when it hits the market, 'cos nothing will make the moral choice starker than an unattractive brick. Not being cynical, just realistic. But we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.
FairPhone people
In the meantime, what's to be done? Your first thought might be for legislation that requires electronics companies to declare the source of the minerals they use. A US law was put in place last year for just this purpose, but:
1. don't expect it to stop the fighting; minerals weren't the cause of the fighting in the first place (that would be land rights and the status of the refugees and militias from neighboring Rwanda who flooded into eastern Congo in the aftermath of the Rwandan genocide in 1994).
2. due to the risk of minerals being smuggled out of the Congo via one of the surrounding countries in order to obfuscate their origin, the legislation requires companies that find they are using minerals from the Congo, or from any of the nine surrounding countries, to determine "with the greatest possible specificity" the specific source mine. (Even the UN is implicated in this mess. According to The Guardian, only recently, a UN truck carrying a tonne of cassiterite was stopped by the Congolese authorities trying to cross the border from Congo to Rwanda. The UN is currently investigating the matter.)
3. since companies are in the business of maximising profits, there's the risk that they might simply choose to avoid buying any minerals at all from the region (the same minerals are available in Brazil and Australia). But if all companies do this, it would be a major problem since some mines are legitimate; and even the mines with militia connections provide a dependable livelihood for many in the region (some estimates put the number of people dependent on the mining industry in eastern Congo at 1 million).
Poulsen's solution, a clear, published supply chain, from minerals’ first extraction to the mobiles, is the right one, but we wish it were the complete solution.What is? No idea, but if you have one, don't hesitate to send it to Enough!, the project set up to created to end genocide and crimes against humanity, and to Dominique Bibaka.