![]() ĬDM was given the responsability to regulate extraction within a perimeter of two carrés miniers (mining squares) of 84.7 ha each in exchange for monopolistic control over production. ![]() Indeed, the local population's voices remain unheard as they say that they lacked compensation for their resettlement, also small buying houses of ore are struggling as they have less access to cobalt as they used before. However, the intention remained dubious even if it became a Zone d'Exploitation Artisanal (ZEA). In 2018, the government tried to regulate the informal activity to show that it could be done safely to minimize death accidents and health consequences. In September 2017, 600 families living in Kasulo were paid by CDM to be displaced from the area. So authorities and Congo Dongfang Mining decided to displace residents of Kasulo and formalize the artisanal mining activities in the area. The first one being to put a ban on artisanal mining digging in the Kasulo Neighborhood however being a Gecamines concession artisanal mining was legal. This situation was putting a lot of pressure in terms of reputation to local authorities and Zheijian Huayou Cobalt, owner of local operator Congo Dongfang Mining to find a sustainable solution. Indeed, five diggers died at the end of July 2014 due to non manage excavation sites. Giant holes began to appear across the neighborhood without some kind of supporting structure, there were high risks of these excavations to collapse. However creuseurs were operating outside the law in highly dangerous and precarious conditions. People remained in the area as it is a safe earning for local communities there. It quickly became a site for artisanal mining and the houses were interspersed with dozen of mine pits and hundreds of creuseurs hunt for cobalt. In 2014, a local dweller discovered cobalt ore under one of the houses in this neighborhood. It is quite poor and there are high unemployment rates. Kasulo is a working-class neighborhood of Kolwezi has been at the heart of the Congolese mining area. ![]() And with this change, Congolese workers say, has come abuse, discrimination and racism". In the last 15 years, Chinese companies have begun to enter the mining business, buying out North American and European companies so that they now control the majority of the cobalt and copper mines in southern DRC. It is mining on a massive scale, highly mechanised and dependent on cutting-edge technology but powered by thousands of workers. 2021) states: "Kolwezi is the DRC’s cobalt capital, a city so defined by mining that some communities sit on the rim of the giant craters that have been excavated in search of copper and cobalt. A report by Pete Pattison in The Guadian (8 Nov. Kolwezi is an important mining centre for copper and cobalt as well as other minerals. Kolwezi is the capital city of Lualaba Province in the South of the DRC, west of Likasi.
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