Bloody batteries

by Luca Catalano Gonzaga
Part of Land and ocean grabbing
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A new form of colonialism is threatening the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), a country where the governor of the province of Katanga has made 14 million hectares of land available to foreign investors. More than half of the world’s cobalt is mined in the Katanga region, in Southeastern country. Cobalt and other strategic minerals, such as lithium and nickel, are present in the new rechargeable lithium ion batteries that power a new generation of electric cars, but also the smartphones, tablets and computers that we use every day. The cobalt mining industry uses heavy machinery and is mainly controlled by foreign companies. The recent “Cobalt blues” report from the “Center for Research on Multinational Corporations” (SOMO), https://www.somo.nl/cobalt-blues/ , describes how mining companies that extract cobalt are involved in land grabbing, in the cancellation of the livelihood of the local community and in violations of workers’ rights. Industry also causes significant environmental damage, including loss of biodiversity and deforestation, air pollution and contamination of water with toxic and radioactive elements, to the detriment of the local population. Men, women, girls and some 40,000 children in the southern Katanga region, are forced to live and work in the so-called “artisanal” mines in unsafe and unhealthy conditions. The photographic report is made in Kanina and Kabamba, remote mining communities on the outskirts of Kolwezi, in the very rich province of Lualaba, ex-Katanga. Here the model of economic and social exploitation produces conditions of inequality and underdevelopment.

Witness Image thanks the local NGO, Bon Pasteur, affiliated with the Good Shepherd International Foundation ONLUS, for logistical support, without which this photographic reportage would not have been possible. (text by Luca Catalano Gonzaga).

  • Kabamba village, Lualaba province, DRC. Anna Kaj waiting with her family for her husband to return from the cobalt mines.
  • Kabamba village, Lualaba province, DRC. Maria Brijitha, 22 years old, an artisanal cobalt miner, at home with her son Francois.
  • Kabamba village, Lualaba province, DRC. Maria Brijitha, 32, working with her husband, during the cobalt washing process. The stones are collected in the rivers, put into plastic bags. Once transported to the miners’ homes, they are dumped onto the ground and sieved by hand using water tanks. Generally, women and children are involved in washing and sorting the mineral.
  • Kabamba village, Lualaba province, DRC. Wa Banza Ngulungu, 18 years old, artisanal cobalt miner, at her home.
  • Kabamba village, Lualaba province, DRC. A whole family washes cobalt with a sieve (a tool consisting of a frame on which a mesh net is stretched, used to separate coltan minerals from other finer sediments). A family of artisanal miners, consisting of a father, mother and two / three children, is able to collect about 100kg of coltan per month with an average income of $150.
  • Kabamba village, Lualaba province, DRC. Makinga Mgoj 14 years old, she is looking after his younger brother, while her parents are working in the cobalt mines.
  • Kabamba village, Lualaba province, DRC. Portrait of Martha Eugenie at home, 12 years old, cobalt artisanal miner.
  • Kabamba village, Lualaba province, DRC. Kalumbu Mulumbule, 38 years old, artisanal cobalt miner, with his sons Maria Beja (2 years old) and Ilunga Malenge (4 years old) in front of their home.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Artisanal miners as they prepare to reach the Magiba river with some tools used for cobalt extraction.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Artisanal miners during cobalt extraction and washing at the Magiba River. To carry out their work, the miners only have their physical strength and some primitive tools (shovels, buckets and sieves to separate the coltan from other finer sediments).
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Artisanal miner using a drainage process to extract cobalt. The miners move the water and the mud through a sieve frame, making the heavier cobalt sink to the bottom.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Cobalt extraction is carried out by small teams normally consisting of 4/6 miners. An average team would receive $90 on average to collect 50 kg of coltan per week.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Julie Kabish, 10 years old, artisanal miner. There is widespread international recognition that the involvement of children in mining constitutes one of the worst forms of child labour. Governments are required to prohibit and eliminate it. According to the latest Unicef estimates (2014 data), there are about 40,000 underage boys and girls working in the cobalt mines of the southern Democratic Republic of Congo.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Cobalt is extracted by a multitude of makeshift miners working in open-cast mines, located along streams and rivers. The miners have only their physical strength and some local tools to carry out their work.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Artisanal miner during the cobalt extraction phase. Local miners sell their products at authorized buying houses located close to the mines, many of which are run by foreign nationals. These buying houses then sell the ore to international trading companies, who refine it within the DRC before exportation. Typically, the mineral is then loaded onto trucks and driven to the South African port of Durban. From there, ships carry most of it to China for further processing and sale to component manufacturers.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Men working together to dig large areas trying to find cobalt. The workers then move water and mud around in washtubs, getting the cobalt to sink to the bottom as it is heavier than mud. Cobalt mining is very well paid by Congolese standards. The average Congo worker makes around $10 a month, while a cobalt miner can make anywhere from $10 to $50 a week. However, compared to other activities this amount is not worth 12 hours of labour.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Young woman as she prepares to extract cobalt through a sieve frame.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Child labor is used in the extraction of cobalt in the Democratic Republic of Congo. According to the latest Unicef estimates (2014 data), there are about 40,000 underage boys and girls working in the cobalt mines of the southern part of the country. These precious minerals are used in the production of rechargeable batteries for our mobile phones, tablets, computers and other electronic devices.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Husband and wife, both are artisanal miners involved in extracting cobalt near the village of Kabamba. The average Congo worker makes around $10 a month, while a cobalt miner can make anywhere from $10 to $50 a week. However, compared to other activities this amount is not worth 12 hours of labour.
  • Kabamba village, Lualaba province, DRC. Single collection point for drinking water near the Lualaba village.
  • Kabamba village, Lualaba province, DRC. Children intent on filling and transporting drinking water tanks.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Child asleep on the banks of the Magiba river, while the parents extract cobalt.
  • Kolwezi city, Lualaba province, DRC. A moment of recreation at the school created by the local NGO, Bon Pasteur, affiliated with the Good Shepherd International Foundation ONLUS. More than 1,600 students are hosted and have quit the mines to attend this school.
  • Kolwezi city, Lualaba province, DRC. A school of more than 1,600 students created by the local NGO, Bon Pasteur, affiliated with the Good Shepherd International Foundation ONLUS. The DRC Child Protection Code (2009), provides free and compulsory primary education for all children. However, because of a lack of adequate state funding, most schools still charge parents a monthly fee to cover costs, such as teacher salaries, uniforms and learning materials. In Kolwezi, the amount varies from between 10 – 30,000 Congolese Francs (US$10-30) per month, which is more than many can afford. Some children do not attend school and work full time, others attend school but work out of school hours, on weekends and holidays.
  • Kolwezi city, Lualaba province, DRC. A school hosting more than 1.600 students, created by the local NGO, Bon Pasteur, affiliated with the Good Shepherd International Foundation ONLUS. Every day approximately 200 primary school children are fed.
  • Kabamba village, Lualaba province, DRC. The village has a population of 1,680, most of whom are artisanal cobalt miners.
  • Kabamba village, Lualaba province, DRC. Maman Mazula, 21 years old, returning to the village from the cobalt mines.
  • Mukoma village, Lualaba province, DRC. Portrait of Kina Matshika, 21 years old, an artisanal cobalt miner.
  • Mukoma village, Lualaba province, DRC. Mutshingisa Kalema, 48 years old, an artisanal cobalt miner, at his home, with a newly captured boa constrictor. Mutshingisa will sell the snake for approximately $100.
  • Mukoma village, Lualaba province, DRC. Portrait of Mita Motta, 22 years old, an artisanal cobalt miner.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province. DRC. Cobalt is mined in the south of the DRC, in the Lualaba and Haut Katanga provinces. This region, bordering Zambia, has always been the DRC’s most significant mining area, but the nature of operations has changed dramatically over time. When they were developed in the early 1900s, the mines were large-scale industrial operations, managed by a single company. Today, industrial cobalt mines are operated by a range of different Congolese and international firms. Running alongside them are many local and non-industrial mining operations.
  • Kabamba village, Lualaba province, DRC. Woman who is about to carry tanks of drinking water.
  • Lualaba province, DRC. The Democratic Republic of Congo is, by far, the single most important source of cobalt in the world. 60% of the world’s cobalt, used in the lithium-ion rechargeable batteries that power electronic devices such as laptops and smartphones, was mined in the DRC. Demand for cobalt is growing at over 5 percent a year, and it is expected to continue doing so as the lithium-ion battery market expands with the increasing popularity of electric vehicles.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Most artisanal miners have been driven out of the mining sites made available to major Western and Chinese companies. They now carry out cobalt mining in unauthorized and unregulated areas or trespass on land controlled by industrial mining companies.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Artisanal miners collect rocks containing cobalt that lie on or near the surface. The stones they choose are then washed and sifted in streams and lakes near the mines. Women and children are generally in charge of washing and sorting the ore.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Cobalt collection center near Lake Malo, owned by the CDM, on the outskirts of Kolwezi. The Congo Dongfang Mining (CDM), is one of the largest mineral processors in the DRC and is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Chinese mineral company Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt Ltd (Huayou Cobalt).
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Cobalt washing at Lake Malo. According to the government’s own estimates, 20% of the cobalt currently exported from the DRC comes from artisanal miners in the southern part of the country. There are approximately 150,000 local miners in this region, who work alongside multinational companies.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Artisanal miners hold up handfuls of cobalt ore that they have scavenged from the mounds of tailings from active industrial mine sites near Lake Malo, Kapata on the outskirts of Kolwezi. The miners must then sort, wash and crush the mineral ore before selling it.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. Women at work cleaning cobalt. Chronic exposure to dust containing cobalt can result in a potentially fatal lung disease, called “hard metal lung disease.” However, the vast majority of miners, who spend long hours every day working with cobalt, do not have even the most basic protective equipment, such as gloves, work clothes or facemasks.
  • Kolwezi mining district, Lualaba province, DRC. A artisanal cobalt miner on the shore of Lake Malo, Kapata, on the outskirts of Kolwezi. Despite the health risks of exposure to cobalt the miner is not wearing a facemask, gloves or any protective clothing.
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