World Land Trust
At the end of May, we celebrated the creation of another 754 acre (305 hectare) nature reserve, called El Oregano, which is helping protect the vast wilderness of the Sierra Gorda—part of a remote mountain range in Central Mexico that is known to be one of the most diverse regions in the country. This land purchase success was achieved thanks largely to generous donations through the The Big Give online fundraising event in December 2011.
Climate change and habitat loss
Roberto Pedraza was born in the Sierra Gorda and works for GESG, a conservation organization his family set up with the support of local people. Roberto works tirelessly to protect as much of his environment as possible, establishing innovative conservation projects to save this threatened habitat and its wildlife. He said, “I don’t have any traumas in my life, apart from climate change. The adaptation rates are failing and already ecosystems are under threat. Our cloud forests have less fog inside them, which puts a great stress on this habitat.”
Cloud forests, found at an altitude of more than 2,500-3,000 meters (6,600-10,000 feet) in elevation, receive most of their moisture from fog. They are unique ecosystems, home to many species found nowhere else.
Roberto’s concern over the effects of climate change on the fragile forests of his homeland is supported in the report published by Nature Climate Change, titled Vulnerability of cloud forest reserves in Mexico to climate change. The report said:
“Tropical montane cloud forests are among the most vulnerable terrestrial ecosystems to climate change owing to their restricted climatic requirements and their narrow and fragmented distribution. […] if we assume unprotected forests are cleared, 99 percent of the entire ecosystem could be lost through a combination of climate change and habitat loss, resulting in the extinction of about 70 percent of endemic cloud forest vertebrate species.”
Yet despite the threat that climate change poses, Roberto remains optimistic: “I think we are doing the right thing; making sure these forests suffer less human pressure is the best way to help and to endure this threat.” On an almost daily basis, Roberto is exposed to the effects of deforestation and the devastating impact it has on his local wildlife: “Recently we went on horseback to the main ridge of the Sierra, the eastern portion of the new reserve, an area that is one of the wildest in the Sierra Gorda but sadly not safe from human pressure—loggers are always looking for new areas to plunder and they are already active not very far away.”
Stopping deforestation and saving wildlife
In the face of this deforestation, WLT has been able to help GESG create three protected nature reserves in just over a year thanks to generous donations to the Buy and Acre appeal.
“The new reserve is 305 hectares of almost pristine temperate and cloud forest," explained Roberto. “It’s truly a very wild piece of forest and bizarre looking with ancient oak trees—reminiscent of the British countryside—growing alongside agave plants with flowers that tower nearly twice my height and strange looking nolina plants.”
Roberto’s enthusiasm as he discovers more about the new reserve is enough to give anyone hope for the future. After a recent visit to the area, he sent this up-date about his wildlife sightings:
“According to our guide it’s common to see 'gatos chicos' (small cats) in the reserve, referring to both Margays and Ocelots. We saw fresh puma marks in the reserve’s ‘trail’ (this is usual for the area), while jaguars and black bears are found in the surrounding forest—stretching across thousands of hectares of vast, empty wilderness.
“I am keen to camp in the reserve and explore more. In the rainy season there is a small creek, which sounds like a very exciting spot to look for salamanders! The whole area feels very old and rugged, with great jagged peaks all around. Any moment you expect a dinosaur to appear.”
WLT is celebrating this great success with Roberto, but we know that we must do more to save this fragile habitat from climate change and deforestation. Most of Mexico's cloud forest, about 88 percent, is unprotected and at risk from deforestation and degradation.
Sir David Attenborough, WLT’s patron, said: “While on one hand we need to take responsibility for our daily life, or to use the catchphrase ‘our Carbon Footprint’, we also have the ability to save wildlife. Let us all rise to the challenge, reduce our impact on the environment and vest any extra cash we have in saving what is left of the world’s wild spaces.”
Visit EcoWatch's BIODIVERSITY and CLIMATE CHANGE pages for more related news on these topics.
Though made in large part of plastic, glass, ceramics, gold and copper, they also contain critical resources. The gallium used for LEDs and the camera flash, the tantalum in capacitors and indium that powers the display were all pulled from the ground — at a price for nature and people.
"Mining raw materials is always problematic, both with regard to human rights and ecology," said Melanie Müller, raw materials expert of the German think tank SWP. "Their production process is pretty toxic."
The gallium and indium in many phones comes from China or South Korea, the tantalum from the Democratic Republic of Congo or Rwanda. All in, such materials comprise less than ten grams of a phone's weight. But these grams finance an international mining industry that causes radioactive earth dumps, poisoned groundwater and Indigenous population displacement.
Environmental Damage: 'Nature Has Been Overexploited'
The problem is that modern technologies don't work without what are known as critical raw materials. Collectively, solar panels, drones, 3D printers and smartphone contain as many as 30 of these different elements sourced from around the globe. A prime example is lithium from Chile, which is essential in the manufacture of batteries for electric vehicles.
"No one, not even within the industry, would deny that mining lithium causes enormous environmental damage," Müller explained, in reference to the artificial lakes companies create when flushing the metal out of underground brine reservoirs. "The process uses vast amounts of water, so you end up with these huge flooded areas where the lithium settles."
This means of extraction results in the destruction and contamination of the natural water system. Unique plants and animals lose access to groundwater and watering holes. There have also been reports of freshwater becoming salinated due to extensive acidic waste water during lithium mining.
But lithium is not the only raw material that causes damage. Securing just one ton of rare earth elements produces 2,000 tons of toxic waste, and has devastated large regions of China, said Günther Hilpert, head of the Asia Research Division of the German think tank SWP.
He says companies there have adopted a process of spraying acid over the mining areas in order to separate the rare earths from other ores, and that mined areas are often abandoned after excavation.
"They are no longer viable for agricultural use," Hilpert said. "Nature has been overexploited."
China is not the only country with low environmental mining standards and poor resource governance. In Madagascar, for example, a thriving illegal gem and metal mining sector has been linked to rainforest depletion and destruction of natural lemur habitats.
States like Madagascar, Rwanda and the DRC score poorly on the Environmental Performance Index that ranks 180 countries for their effort on factors including conservation, air quality, waste management and emissions. Environmentalists are therefore particularly concerned that these countries are mining highly toxic materials like beryllium, tantalum and cobalt.
But it is not only nature that suffers from the extraction of high-demand critical raw materials.
"It is a dirty, toxic, partly radioactive industry," Hilpert said. "China, for example, has never really cared about human rights when it comes to achieving production targets."
Dirty, Toxic, Radioactive: Working in the Mining Sector
One of the most extreme examples is Baotou, a Chinese city in Inner Mongolia, where rare earth mining poisoned surrounding farms and nearby villages, causing thousands of people to leave the area.
In 2012, The Guardian described a toxic lake created in conjunction with rare earth mining as "a murky expanse of water, in which no fish or algae can survive. The shore is coated with a black crust, so thick you can walk on it. Into this huge, 10 sq km tailings pond nearby factories discharge water loaded with chemicals used to process the 17 most sought after minerals in the world."
Local residents reported health issues including aching legs, diabetes, osteoporosis and chest problems, The Guardian wrote.
South Africa has also been held up for turning a blind eye to the health impacts of mining.
"The platinum sector in South Africa has been criticized for performing very poorly on human rights — even within the raw materials sector," Müller said.
In 2012, security forces killed 34 miners who had been protesting poor working conditions and low wages at a mine owned by the British company Lonmin. What became known as the "Marikana massacre" triggered several spontaneous strikes across the country's mining sector.
Müller says miners can still face exposure to acid drainage — a frequent byproduct of platinum mining — that can cause chemical burns and severe lung damage. Though this can be prevented by a careful waste system.
Some progress was made in 2016 when the South African government announced plans to make mining companies pay $800 million (€679 million) for recycling acid mine water. But they didn't all comply. In 2020, activists sued Australian-owned mining company Mintails and the government to cover the cost of environmental cleanup.
Another massive issue around mining is water consumption. Since the extraction of critical raw materials is very water intensive, drought prone countries such as South Africa, have witnessed an increase in conflicts over supply.
For years, industry, government and the South African public debated – without a clear agreement – whether companies should get privileged access to water and how much the population may suffer from shortages.
Mining in Brazil: Replacing Nature, People, Land Rights
Beyond the direct health and environmental impact of mining toxic substances, quarrying critical raw materials destroys livelihoods, as developments in Brazil demonstrate.
"Brazil is the major worldwide niobium producer and reserves in [the state of] Minas Gerais would last more than 200 years [at the current rate of demand]," said Juliana Siqueira-Gay, environmental engineer and Ph.D. student at the University of São Paulo.
While the overall number of niobium mining requests is stagnating, the share of claims for Indigenous land has skyrocketed from 3 to 36 percent within one year. If granted, 23 percent of the Amazon forest and the homeland of 222 Indigenous groups could fall victim to deforestation in the name of mining, a study by Siqueira-Gay finds.
In early 2020, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro signed a bill which would allow corporations to develop areas populated by Indigenous communities in the future. The law has not yet entered into force, but "this policy could have long-lasting negative effects on Brazil's socio-biodiversity," said Siqueira-Gay.
One example are the niobium reserves in Seis Lagos, in Brazil's northeast, which could be quarried to build electrolytic capacitors for smartphones.
"They overlap the Balaio Indigenous land and it would cause major impacts in Indigenous communities by clearing forests responsible for providing food, raw materials and regulating the local climate," Siqueira-Gay explained.
She says scientific good practice guidelines offer a blueprint for sustainable mining that adheres to human rights and protects forests. Quarries in South America — and especially Brazil — funded by multilaterial banks like the International Finance Corporation of the World Bank Group have to follow these guidelines, Siqueira-Gay said.
They force companies to develop sustainable water supply, minimize acid exposure and re-vegetate mined surfaces. "First, negative impacts must be avoided, then minimized and at last compensated — not the other way around."
Reposted with permission from DW.