WEBVTT - Nicolas Niarchos Exposes the Cobalt Gold Rush 0:00:02.160 --> 0:00:05.040 I'm Alec Baldwin and you were listening to Here's the 0:00:05.120 --> 0:00:09.000 Thing from My Heart Radio. There's been a lot of 0:00:09.039 --> 0:00:12.760 talk about who should replace Daniel Craig now that he 0:00:12.840 --> 0:00:16.000 is retiring as James Bond, and I think I have 0:00:16.120 --> 0:00:21.840 found the perfect person. He's handsome, charming, brilliant and multi lingual. 0:00:22.520 --> 0:00:25.279 His name is Nicholas ni ArkOS, and if only he 0:00:25.320 --> 0:00:28.360 could put down his computer long enough to play the part. 0:00:29.240 --> 0:00:33.559 Ni ArkOS is a journalist. His choice of unglamorous and 0:00:33.720 --> 0:00:37.199 at times dangerous profession is all the more surprising when 0:00:37.200 --> 0:00:41.800 you learn about his background. His grandfather, Stavros Niarchos, founded 0:00:41.840 --> 0:00:45.920 the international shipping company ni ArkOS Limited. I first came 0:00:45.960 --> 0:00:49.839 across ni ArkOS in The New Yorker magazine. His recent 0:00:49.920 --> 0:00:54.280 piece Buried Dreams covers the exploitation of workers in the 0:00:54.320 --> 0:00:58.840 cobalt mines in Central Africa. In his reporting, ni ArkOS 0:00:58.880 --> 0:01:02.440 exposed the danger of us and exploitative conditions for the 0:01:02.480 --> 0:01:06.080 workers in Congolese cobalt minds, many of whom are children, 0:01:06.520 --> 0:01:09.319 as well as those that's down to profit handsomely off 0:01:09.480 --> 0:01:13.040 the minds. In addition to being a reporter at large 0:01:13.040 --> 0:01:15.800 at the New Yorker, New York coss work has appeared 0:01:15.800 --> 0:01:19.680 in Time, the New York Times, and the Nation. I 0:01:19.720 --> 0:01:21.640 think that all the places that I try and work 0:01:21.680 --> 0:01:27.240 for require a sort of serious journalistic engagement. And that's 0:01:27.240 --> 0:01:29.120 what I really seek for. When I look for a 0:01:29.120 --> 0:01:32.759 publication to write for The New Yorker, I find the 0:01:32.800 --> 0:01:34.920 fact checking process. I was a fact checker for for 0:01:34.920 --> 0:01:37.760 for many years. I think that's a very engaging thing 0:01:37.880 --> 0:01:40.440 to deal with. I like working directly with the fact checkers. 0:01:40.480 --> 0:01:43.400 I liked being a fact checker, learning a great deal 0:01:43.440 --> 0:01:45.800 about a subject, you know, for a couple of weeks, 0:01:45.800 --> 0:01:48.600 and then and then sort of moving on. And actually 0:01:48.640 --> 0:01:52.360 I found now as a reporter actually enhances my reporting. 0:01:52.520 --> 0:01:55.040 It leads me down new alleys when I'm trying to 0:01:55.080 --> 0:01:57.640 sort of verify things, to the kind of hundreds of 0:01:58.080 --> 0:02:00.160 descience kind of thing. When you when you factor you 0:02:00.200 --> 0:02:02.240 did it for how long? I did for five years? Actually, 0:02:02.400 --> 0:02:06.440 well almost four years and eleven months. Did they confine 0:02:06.480 --> 0:02:09.240 you to fact checking in a certain realm or did 0:02:09.280 --> 0:02:11.320 you fact check a lot of different things? I fact 0:02:11.400 --> 0:02:13.680 checked a lot of different things because I speak French 0:02:13.720 --> 0:02:17.200 and Italian obviously, when there were stories which required those languages. 0:02:17.560 --> 0:02:19.920 I would I would be sort of fact you were 0:02:19.919 --> 0:02:22.680 the go to fact checker sometimes, Yeah, when you when 0:02:22.680 --> 0:02:25.040 you would do the fact checking or I mean were 0:02:25.080 --> 0:02:28.560 there once you enjoyed more like ones that were like 0:02:28.680 --> 0:02:31.840 deep and intense and scientific or culture whatever, and did 0:02:31.880 --> 0:02:34.240 you did you didn't love, You didn't love doing the 0:02:34.280 --> 0:02:36.600 fact checking of the profile of some actress, or you 0:02:36.680 --> 0:02:39.560 enjoyed all of it. I enjoyed all of it, you know. Listen. 0:02:39.560 --> 0:02:41.800 I worked on a piece on TMZ by Nick Schmiddle, 0:02:41.880 --> 0:02:43.800 which was a kind of investigative piece, and that was 0:02:43.800 --> 0:02:47.040 a kind of crazy experience that was kind of so well, 0:02:47.080 --> 0:02:49.720 I don't know, sort of more you know, kind of 0:02:49.800 --> 0:02:52.440 input and sort of back and forth and lawyers and whatever. 0:02:52.800 --> 0:02:54.800 Then most other pieces, you know, sometimes it would do 0:02:54.840 --> 0:02:57.800 pieces on Iraq and Afghanistan and so on, and they 0:02:57.800 --> 0:03:01.000 were quite less less lay in a stated how Darfy 0:03:01.240 --> 0:03:05.960 or Harvey love them exactly exactly blash, But no, I 0:03:06.000 --> 0:03:09.120 loved working with I mean the writers. They're a great 0:03:09.240 --> 0:03:13.240 Patrick Keith, Sarah Stillman, Rachel I mean this this kind 0:03:13.280 --> 0:03:16.960 of made Rebecca Mede. Rebecca was actually a sort of 0:03:17.360 --> 0:03:21.000 wonderful early person I've fact checked quite quite early on 0:03:21.040 --> 0:03:23.240 in my career there and then kind of ended up 0:03:23.320 --> 0:03:24.639 sort of doing quite a lot with her, which was 0:03:24.720 --> 0:03:27.400 quite fun. And we did a piece i remember on 0:03:27.520 --> 0:03:29.720 adult and Cabano, and we just had like a lot 0:03:29.760 --> 0:03:32.400 of back and forth with Dultri caban as people, and 0:03:32.400 --> 0:03:35.360 it was just it was sort of hilarious because sometimes 0:03:35.400 --> 0:03:37.720 you know, those sort of fashion stories and so on. 0:03:37.760 --> 0:03:40.280 I mean, if you're talking with people in government and 0:03:40.320 --> 0:03:42.720 so on, they kind of they have this attitude that, oh, well, 0:03:42.760 --> 0:03:44.760 it's a story, it's going to go away, Whereas you know, 0:03:44.800 --> 0:03:46.440 if it's a big fashion house and you know, this 0:03:46.560 --> 0:03:48.120 is one of the few times that it appears in 0:03:48.120 --> 0:03:50.800 The New Yorker, you know this year or in the 0:03:50.960 --> 0:03:53.800 you know, in five years or whatever, they realized that 0:03:53.800 --> 0:03:56.960 that's going to stick with the marketing for them. Yeah, 0:03:57.040 --> 0:03:59.640 exactly a degree. Um well, I mean, I'm obviously in 0:03:59.720 --> 0:04:02.480 every reader of The New Yorker. The thing I tend 0:04:02.520 --> 0:04:04.440 to see when I when I was thinking about your 0:04:04.560 --> 0:04:07.520 article and budgets and costs and things like that, is that, 0:04:07.680 --> 0:04:10.320 you know, the magazine has obviously a menu in different articles. 0:04:10.320 --> 0:04:11.760 There might be a profile, there might be you know, 0:04:11.760 --> 0:04:14.520 there's obviously the shouts and murmurs and talk of the 0:04:14.560 --> 0:04:16.240 town and so. But of the body of the pieces 0:04:16.240 --> 0:04:18.039 that are not criticism or art or what have you, 0:04:18.160 --> 0:04:20.760 there seems to be a limit, I would imagine of 0:04:20.800 --> 0:04:22.800 the number of pieces that are this expansive, because it 0:04:22.880 --> 0:04:25.839 must be expensive. Correct. You know, I started this piece 0:04:25.880 --> 0:04:28.560 reporting it for as a book, and the first it 0:04:28.680 --> 0:04:31.240 started as a as a sort of book reporting and 0:04:31.279 --> 0:04:34.440 then and then kind of developed into New Yorker reporting. 0:04:34.440 --> 0:04:36.839 So actually I funded some of it from my own money, 0:04:36.920 --> 0:04:39.360 and then I used some of the New Yorker what 0:04:39.400 --> 0:04:41.919 the New Yorker paid me to to sort of continue 0:04:41.960 --> 0:04:44.320 the reporting. But actually, you know, this was a sort 0:04:44.320 --> 0:04:46.920 of budget less piece at the beginning. You first became 0:04:46.960 --> 0:04:49.679 aware of this when and how I first became aware 0:04:49.720 --> 0:04:53.400 of this issue around cobalt mining because of somebody called 0:04:53.520 --> 0:04:57.920 Dan Gutler. He is a mining billionaire who has sort 0:04:57.920 --> 0:05:01.440 of made his wealth in the DRC, and he actually 0:05:01.440 --> 0:05:04.760 made a lot of money. Buy he's from Israel. Originally 0:05:04.800 --> 0:05:07.000 he came to DRC. It's a crazy story. Came when 0:05:07.000 --> 0:05:08.800 he was about twenty three, and by the time he 0:05:08.839 --> 0:05:12.720 was twenty six, he was in charge of the congo's 0:05:13.080 --> 0:05:16.320 entire diamond export and then various sort of human rights 0:05:16.360 --> 0:05:18.800 groups groups are like, wait, well, what's happening here. He 0:05:18.920 --> 0:05:21.479 was very close to the ruling family and so he 0:05:21.560 --> 0:05:23.960 was kind of booted off that and Congo said, look, listen, 0:05:24.000 --> 0:05:26.039 look we've dealt with this problem. And suddenly it turned 0:05:26.080 --> 0:05:28.120 out that he had a bunch of copper and cobalt 0:05:28.160 --> 0:05:30.960 mines down in the south, which he seemed to be basically, 0:05:31.560 --> 0:05:34.160 and this is very well documented by the Carter Center 0:05:34.279 --> 0:05:37.600 and sort of human rights watching various other institutions, basically 0:05:37.640 --> 0:05:40.359 he was selling them on for the ruling family to 0:05:40.520 --> 0:05:43.920 finance their elections. So he had basically flipped the minds 0:05:43.960 --> 0:05:46.200 and he became aware of him. How I became aware 0:05:46.240 --> 0:05:47.600 of him. I have a very good friend of mine 0:05:47.640 --> 0:05:50.600 who works in mining, and I was sort of casting 0:05:50.640 --> 0:05:56.160 around for stories related to Africa, related to corruption and 0:05:56.160 --> 0:05:58.840 so on, and he said, well, listen, I mean look, 0:05:58.920 --> 0:06:03.479 no Risco exactly. And also actually Patrick Keith, who has 0:06:03.520 --> 0:06:05.160 been a great sort of inspiration to me and I 0:06:05.600 --> 0:06:08.440 worked with actually at the New Yorker, and you had 0:06:08.480 --> 0:06:10.520 Alex Gibney on the show and he you know, they 0:06:10.560 --> 0:06:14.200 collaborated on the opioid story acted to Patrick on the 0:06:14.200 --> 0:06:17.320 street the other day with his family down in the village, 0:06:17.320 --> 0:06:19.279 and I just said to myself, my god, I thought 0:06:19.279 --> 0:06:23.320 they documented withal. So he'd done a piece on Bennie 0:06:23.360 --> 0:06:27.000 stein Metz, who was a Israeli mining billionaire. I think 0:06:27.000 --> 0:06:30.640 he's he's currently been arrested or he's on trial in Switzerland, 0:06:30.800 --> 0:06:34.520 and he had basically taken control of an iron are 0:06:34.560 --> 0:06:37.719 mine called Simon Do, which is in Guinea. And so 0:06:37.839 --> 0:06:39.480 Patrick had done that story, and that was a kind 0:06:39.480 --> 0:06:42.560 of great inspiration. And then I sort of went to Patrick, 0:06:42.600 --> 0:06:44.880 and Patrick said, list and you should also follow the story. 0:06:44.880 --> 0:06:47.440 It's a great idea. I've always wanted to do Gartler. 0:06:47.480 --> 0:06:49.880 And then I arrived in Congo and I realized that 0:06:49.920 --> 0:06:52.480 the Gartler story was very interesting, but it wasn't the 0:06:52.480 --> 0:06:56.279 whole story. And actually what became more interested interesting to 0:06:56.320 --> 0:07:00.719 me is the lives of these people. Just the hellish 0:07:00.760 --> 0:07:04.680 existence of a cobalt minor, an artisanal cobalt minor have 0:07:04.760 --> 0:07:08.320 to be preciser in the southern DRC. Now I read 0:07:08.320 --> 0:07:12.320 the article and you become suspicious. So you become enlightened, 0:07:12.360 --> 0:07:15.360 if you will, to the idea that huge swaths of 0:07:15.440 --> 0:07:18.360 this continent are being exploited for these kinds of minerals, 0:07:18.720 --> 0:07:20.880 and and and if I may say so, you'll let 0:07:20.880 --> 0:07:24.080 you speak to this, not just the greatest hits like 0:07:24.160 --> 0:07:29.320 petroleum based things, but these cobalts for lithium for modern technology, chips, 0:07:29.600 --> 0:07:33.000 photovoltaic whatever they may be used for batteries, mostly correct 0:07:33.160 --> 0:07:35.160 the lithium battery. It was it safe to say, you 0:07:35.200 --> 0:07:38.120 talk about Guinea, you talk about d r C. Is 0:07:38.240 --> 0:07:42.000 this happening all over Africa where these minerals exist, I mean, American, Israeli. 0:07:42.040 --> 0:07:43.800 It doesn't matter pirates or when they're trying to grab 0:07:43.840 --> 0:07:45.920 as much of it as they can. Well, it depends where. 0:07:45.960 --> 0:07:49.320 Obviously some places are better regulated than others. Who's doing 0:07:49.320 --> 0:07:51.760 a good job of regulating if you can say, I think, 0:07:51.920 --> 0:07:54.960 for example, Zambia has had a better track record, although 0:07:55.040 --> 0:07:57.679 now the sort of influx of Chinese wealth into Zambia 0:07:58.000 --> 0:07:59.720 has sort of up ended some of that. And what 0:07:59.760 --> 0:08:01.960 if he was seeking their copper as well. So it's 0:08:01.960 --> 0:08:03.800 actually on the border with d r C. When I 0:08:03.840 --> 0:08:05.640 was reporting some of this stuff, I actually flew to 0:08:05.720 --> 0:08:09.280 Zambia to meet sort of renegade Congolese politician before he 0:08:09.360 --> 0:08:12.800 was traveling back into the DRC. So yeah, no, it's 0:08:12.800 --> 0:08:14.920 known as the Copper Belt, and it's it's a sort 0:08:14.920 --> 0:08:18.000 of large the scene between the two countries exactly exactly. 0:08:18.080 --> 0:08:20.800 And the other big one is coldtan actually, and that's 0:08:20.840 --> 0:08:23.280 sort of been the focus of a lot of human 0:08:23.360 --> 0:08:27.400 rights work because it is largely mined by sort of 0:08:27.560 --> 0:08:29.840 army types and sort of war lords in the northeast 0:08:29.880 --> 0:08:33.400 of the DRC. And coltan is used in capacitors, which 0:08:33.400 --> 0:08:36.560 are sort of key for computers and batteries. That's also 0:08:36.600 --> 0:08:39.000 been a big issue and people confuse that with cobalt, 0:08:39.520 --> 0:08:43.760 and actually what's happening there is is slightly different from cobalt, 0:08:43.760 --> 0:08:47.040 which is a kind of more of a mechanized, sort 0:08:47.040 --> 0:08:50.320 of legitimized a type of trade. Well, the thing that 0:08:50.480 --> 0:08:52.840 also struck me in terms of any story like this 0:08:52.920 --> 0:08:56.120 with there's danger described to me what you had to 0:08:56.120 --> 0:08:58.560 do in advanced security wise, you don't just land at 0:08:58.559 --> 0:09:00.960 the airport and say in an uber and say take 0:09:01.040 --> 0:09:03.080 me to you know, Cobal town. There must have been 0:09:03.080 --> 0:09:05.800 a lot of preparatory steps you took and security steps took. 0:09:05.800 --> 0:09:07.920 Give I'm assuming, and then talk about when you first 0:09:07.960 --> 0:09:10.480 got there for the first time. What went on? Okay, 0:09:10.520 --> 0:09:13.800 so yeah, the security steps. I mean, I've traveled to 0:09:13.920 --> 0:09:16.280 quite a lot at this point of countries which sort 0:09:16.320 --> 0:09:20.360 of have different complicated security profiles, At places like Yamen, 0:09:20.440 --> 0:09:22.880 Western Sahara, in fact, this southern part of the d 0:09:23.040 --> 0:09:25.199 r C. You know, there is the threat always of 0:09:25.280 --> 0:09:29.560 randomized violence, but I, you know, had looked into it. 0:09:29.640 --> 0:09:32.480 I've spoken to a couple of people who had been there. 0:09:32.520 --> 0:09:36.440 I've spoken to a couple of journalists, and I don't 0:09:36.480 --> 0:09:39.440 think there was a kind of threatening or kind of 0:09:39.520 --> 0:09:44.200 looming threat. I wasn't particularly afraid that. You know, sometimes 0:09:44.240 --> 0:09:46.560 traveling on the road at night, you'd be stopped at 0:09:46.600 --> 0:09:49.280 roadblocks and there would be sort of policemen with guns 0:09:49.320 --> 0:09:51.440 and they'll be drunk, and you know, then you get 0:09:51.440 --> 0:09:54.400 a little bit nervous, and then we were sort of 0:09:54.400 --> 0:09:57.040 held up in broad daylight. So I traveled with the 0:09:57.040 --> 0:09:59.760 local journalist called Jeff Kazadi, who's a who's a wonderful 0:09:59.760 --> 0:10:02.240 one a guy, and he's he's he was a great resource. 0:10:02.280 --> 0:10:05.320 He worked as a translator. He was incredibly sort of 0:10:05.360 --> 0:10:08.120 resourceful as well on on the ground, and he sort 0:10:08.160 --> 0:10:10.200 of knew quite a few of the operators, and he 0:10:10.240 --> 0:10:13.440 had worked with I believe CNN before and some other 0:10:13.640 --> 0:10:17.120 journalists who had been down to do stories like this 0:10:17.240 --> 0:10:19.560 or to do other types of stories in Southern DRC. 0:10:20.040 --> 0:10:24.040 He works for a mining trade publication, so you know, 0:10:24.240 --> 0:10:27.720 oftentimes he wanted to sort of look further into stories, 0:10:27.760 --> 0:10:31.000 but because he works for an industry publication, it wasn't 0:10:31.040 --> 0:10:33.199 the type of journalism that they were interested in. So 0:10:33.280 --> 0:10:36.840 I contacted Jeff. I also contacted another journalist, ben Nyemba, 0:10:37.000 --> 0:10:39.079 who who's based out of there, and he was interested 0:10:39.120 --> 0:10:41.240 in this. So the first time I went, I went 0:10:41.280 --> 0:10:43.679 with Jeff and Ben. We kind of thought about the 0:10:43.720 --> 0:10:46.960 security risks and we discussed the different types of issues 0:10:47.000 --> 0:10:49.319 along the road. Sometimes there were bandits and so on, 0:10:49.400 --> 0:10:52.120 but usually if you're traveling in the daytime and you're 0:10:52.120 --> 0:10:54.600 fairly safe along that road. So when I first arrived 0:10:54.600 --> 0:10:56.920 in the South, I've been in Conshassa for a bit 0:10:57.200 --> 0:10:59.959 and in many ways the South is much less hectic 0:11:00.040 --> 0:11:03.920 lincl Chassa and I arrived on a local flight so 0:11:03.960 --> 0:11:06.160 we didn't have to deal with customs. I stayed in 0:11:06.200 --> 0:11:09.280 a sort of very downbeat hotel, which was an interesting 0:11:09.400 --> 0:11:11.360 experience to say the least, there were a lot of 0:11:11.480 --> 0:11:13.520 women coming in at night and leaving in the morning, 0:11:14.320 --> 0:11:20.280 but afterwards everywhere, which is everywhere exactly. And then I 0:11:20.320 --> 0:11:24.000 stayed the next two or three times I was there 0:11:24.040 --> 0:11:27.040 in more kind of like hotels that sort of mining 0:11:27.080 --> 0:11:29.640 execs had made their home. It was, you know, kind 0:11:29.640 --> 0:11:32.240 of immediately there with people at the bar kind of 0:11:32.280 --> 0:11:34.559 talking about their sort of the you know, the greatest 0:11:34.640 --> 0:11:38.240 hits of you know, copper mines and cobalt mines, some 0:11:38.280 --> 0:11:41.280 of the work that some of the useful work done there. Yeah, 0:11:41.320 --> 0:11:44.400 and those are sort of like off the record chats usually, 0:11:44.559 --> 0:11:47.800 but it helps you get get such a good sort 0:11:47.800 --> 0:11:49.720 of context around this up. You know what else was 0:11:49.800 --> 0:11:55.120 very useful useful is that I visited a mining conference 0:11:55.160 --> 0:11:57.920 there as well and sort of met a lot of 0:11:57.960 --> 0:12:01.280 people in the field. It was hosted by a South 0:12:01.320 --> 0:12:03.640 African firm, but it was kind of visited by all 0:12:03.679 --> 0:12:06.000 the sort of local potents and so on. It was 0:12:06.040 --> 0:12:09.719 a sort of eye opening experience because people are very 0:12:09.720 --> 0:12:12.920 aware of the problem of artisanal mining. And you have 0:12:13.000 --> 0:12:15.960 to make the distinction between artisanal mining and industrial mining. 0:12:16.440 --> 0:12:19.720 So artisanal mining is something somewhere between ten and thirty 0:12:19.760 --> 0:12:23.000 percent of Congo's production every year. It really fluctuates depending 0:12:23.000 --> 0:12:25.920 on you know, supply demands so on. And the rest 0:12:25.960 --> 0:12:28.640 is industrial, which has done much in the way of 0:12:28.800 --> 0:12:31.800 large mining firms anywhere else in the world. And do 0:12:31.880 --> 0:12:33.960 the industrials want to put the artisanals out of work? 0:12:34.240 --> 0:12:37.960 The industrials would probably prefer that the artisanals were not 0:12:38.200 --> 0:12:41.920 there because there are serious human rights issues with some 0:12:42.040 --> 0:12:44.719 of the artisanal minds, which with many of the artismal minds, 0:12:44.760 --> 0:12:49.240 I would say some are led by cooperatives, and those 0:12:49.280 --> 0:12:52.320 co operatives are sort of better about safety than other 0:12:52.400 --> 0:12:56.319 sort of non coatrial co operative managed artisanal minds. However, 0:12:56.520 --> 0:12:59.760 the big problem is that there's just been a huge 0:13:00.000 --> 0:13:02.360 flux of people into that region. It's a gold rush. 0:13:02.480 --> 0:13:05.240 It's a huge gold rush, and you really feel like 0:13:05.360 --> 0:13:07.400 just people are arriving every day, that kind of thing. 0:13:07.400 --> 0:13:10.000 There's a train that comes down from a place called 0:13:10.120 --> 0:13:13.040 Mbuji Mai, which is in the middle of Congo, and 0:13:13.200 --> 0:13:15.920 that is a place in which there used to be 0:13:15.960 --> 0:13:19.040 a huge amount of diamond mining and that's been sort 0:13:19.040 --> 0:13:21.640 of woefully mismanaged and the industry has kind of fallen 0:13:21.640 --> 0:13:23.600 into pieces. So a lot of people who had some 0:13:23.720 --> 0:13:26.520 mining experience and now sort of getting on that train 0:13:26.600 --> 0:13:29.440 which goes through the sort of jungles and wilds of 0:13:29.520 --> 0:13:33.960 Central Congo and comes to Lumumbashi and sort of people 0:13:34.000 --> 0:13:35.440 are just sort of hanging off the side of that 0:13:35.480 --> 0:13:38.640 train and it comes, you know, every two months or 0:13:38.720 --> 0:13:41.400 something like that. Nobody really the the schedule basically works 0:13:41.440 --> 0:13:44.040 on you know, whenever it's completely full, whenever they can 0:13:44.080 --> 0:13:46.640 sort of get the engine running. And so with that, 0:13:46.960 --> 0:13:50.000 you know, people come. And then the industrial mines are 0:13:50.040 --> 0:13:52.560 sort of run by very few people, so they don't 0:13:52.600 --> 0:13:55.800 have the capacity to observe resolve that labor force exactly. 0:13:55.880 --> 0:13:59.400 They don't they can't hire. So yeah, I think they 0:13:59.559 --> 0:14:02.800 arrived to participate in artisanal mining. Exactly. You arrived because 0:14:02.800 --> 0:14:04.320 you think you're going to get rich and there's just 0:14:04.360 --> 0:14:06.840 like a lot of stories about it and so on, 0:14:06.920 --> 0:14:09.400 and you arrive and there's nothing to do apart from 0:14:09.520 --> 0:14:13.199 artisanal mining basically, and people really exploit that they get 0:14:13.240 --> 0:14:16.679 paid nothing. I mean, it's it's some people say that 0:14:16.720 --> 0:14:19.720 there have been people who made lots and lots of money, 0:14:19.760 --> 0:14:22.640 but I actually found that quite difficult to believe. After 0:14:22.800 --> 0:14:25.800 spending two months there, I just so you went the 0:14:25.840 --> 0:14:27.560 one on the one trip for two months. So I 0:14:27.560 --> 0:14:29.800 went on one trip for a month, then I went 0:14:29.960 --> 0:14:32.720 on another trip for ten days, and then I was 0:14:32.760 --> 0:14:35.040 there for about almost a month the next time, so 0:14:35.400 --> 0:14:39.240 two months. So when you arrive and you are in 0:14:39.280 --> 0:14:42.480 the more decent hotel with people who seem to be 0:14:42.560 --> 0:14:44.640 related to the whole enterprise, and you can church out 0:14:44.680 --> 0:14:46.880 with him. Is the idea that when you arrive, you 0:14:46.960 --> 0:14:49.160 don't go right into the belly of the beast and 0:14:49.200 --> 0:14:52.680 go to where the artisanal mining is at full at 0:14:52.720 --> 0:14:55.040 full throttle. You kind of work your way towards that is, 0:14:55.400 --> 0:14:57.000 did you take a few days before you get into 0:14:57.000 --> 0:15:00.040 the into the pits so to speak? Depends actually on 0:15:00.360 --> 0:15:02.360 the different trips. On my second trip, I went straight 0:15:02.400 --> 0:15:04.920 to the artisman mining because I spent a lot of time, 0:15:05.120 --> 0:15:07.480 you know, talking with Seth Effricans about, you know, the 0:15:07.520 --> 0:15:10.000 benefits of copper mining for the area. So you know, 0:15:10.080 --> 0:15:12.680 I had all that material and I wanted to really 0:15:12.960 --> 0:15:16.360 focus on the the artisanal miners, who were people that 0:15:16.440 --> 0:15:18.880 sounded like they had not the right idea, but maybe 0:15:18.920 --> 0:15:21.080 the better ideas about how this should be handled, what 0:15:21.120 --> 0:15:23.600 should happen there for the greater good of everybody. So 0:15:23.680 --> 0:15:27.680 there's a Catholic charity called Good Shepherd, called Ways, and 0:15:27.840 --> 0:15:32.080 they've been incredibly sort of outspoken and sort of quite 0:15:32.080 --> 0:15:35.120 sort of research focused as well around some of these issues. 0:15:35.480 --> 0:15:38.040 They've put forward this plan which says, listen, you need 0:15:38.080 --> 0:15:41.120 to develop other types of industry because you have to 0:15:41.200 --> 0:15:44.000 understand this as like a as a cycle of which 0:15:44.040 --> 0:15:46.800 corruption is only a part. There's also just the basic 0:15:46.840 --> 0:15:52.160 fact of poverty and and need. So they have suggested 0:15:52.280 --> 0:15:56.640 that agriculture would be a way of engaging the local population. 0:15:56.680 --> 0:15:59.000 In fact, it's a very fertile region as well, and 0:15:59.120 --> 0:16:02.360 something like ninety cent of Congo's food is imported, so 0:16:02.680 --> 0:16:06.160 there's this kind of from other areas, from from Zambia, 0:16:06.200 --> 0:16:08.640 from from other areas of the region. So there's this 0:16:08.720 --> 0:16:11.440 kind and and import taxes are huge, and people are 0:16:11.480 --> 0:16:13.720 making money every step of the way, and so on 0:16:13.720 --> 0:16:16.560 and so forth, often not Congolese. So they say, listen, 0:16:16.560 --> 0:16:18.880 why don't the Congolese grow their own food here? Why 0:16:18.880 --> 0:16:21.800 don't people work on farms? And so I think that 0:16:21.800 --> 0:16:25.200 that's a you know, there are large businesses that obviously 0:16:25.600 --> 0:16:28.560 invested in this. I think that's actually something which would 0:16:28.600 --> 0:16:31.480 be positive for them to do. So. There are also 0:16:31.560 --> 0:16:34.000 some other groups like the Fair Cobalt Alliance, and then 0:16:34.040 --> 0:16:38.320 there's another Chinese group. The u N doesn't have a 0:16:38.360 --> 0:16:40.960 permanent presence, I don't think in con ways. Actually, a 0:16:41.000 --> 0:16:43.600 lot of what they do in Congo is to do 0:16:43.640 --> 0:16:46.280 with rebels in the north, and then they assisted with 0:16:46.480 --> 0:16:49.680 war crimes tribunals in a city which was not too 0:16:49.720 --> 0:16:54.120 far away. So they do mainly kind of like armed 0:16:54.160 --> 0:16:56.600 conflict type stuff there. I didn't see any sort of 0:16:56.720 --> 0:16:59.400 UN involvement, but I could you know, they could that 0:16:59.480 --> 0:17:01.440 they could, Yeah, they could. They could be a UN 0:17:01.480 --> 0:17:03.880 office that focuses on this, but it doesn't seem to 0:17:03.880 --> 0:17:07.200 be a main priority because they're focused on, you know something, 0:17:07.240 --> 0:17:09.879 what what year did you go there? I went and 0:17:10.160 --> 0:17:14.000 right before the right before? How convenient for you? Wonderful? 0:17:14.320 --> 0:17:16.399 And what is the national government? To the extent you 0:17:16.400 --> 0:17:18.720 could you could ascertain when you're there, what's their position 0:17:18.720 --> 0:17:21.040 of what's going on there? So the national government makes 0:17:21.119 --> 0:17:23.480 kind of these overtures over and over again, saying we 0:17:23.560 --> 0:17:26.479 can't have child labor whatever, and then the local government 0:17:26.480 --> 0:17:28.320 will say the same thing, and they're like, we're cleaning 0:17:28.359 --> 0:17:30.280 up the minds and then they used you know, these 0:17:30.359 --> 0:17:34.040 kind of mind clean up activities in order to basically 0:17:34.119 --> 0:17:37.199 sees more parts of the minds for themselves and you know, 0:17:37.400 --> 0:17:40.560 kind of co opt local co operatives and so on. 0:17:40.600 --> 0:17:43.520 And I document that in the piece. And at the 0:17:43.560 --> 0:17:46.040 moment there's a bit of a power struggle happening down 0:17:46.080 --> 0:17:49.560 in that region, and it's very unclear to me what's 0:17:49.560 --> 0:17:52.239 actually happening in terms of like who's getting pieces of 0:17:52.240 --> 0:17:54.720 the pie, But the fact is that it still continues. Actually, 0:17:54.720 --> 0:17:58.480 I was speaking to a friend of mine who's a photographer, 0:17:58.560 --> 0:18:00.840 Hugh can Sell a Cunningham who's done great, great work 0:18:01.040 --> 0:18:05.160 and in the DRC. He was there last weekend and 0:18:05.240 --> 0:18:08.919 he saw basically exactly the same condition. So it's not improving. 0:18:09.080 --> 0:18:11.240 But I'm assuming for people who don't understand the way 0:18:11.280 --> 0:18:15.119 these things work, it's that you have the corporate mining, 0:18:15.160 --> 0:18:18.400 you have the industrial mining, which of course the government's 0:18:18.400 --> 0:18:20.080 going to sanction that because they're gonna make a lot 0:18:20.080 --> 0:18:22.919 of money. I'm assuming, just like the drug trade and 0:18:22.960 --> 0:18:25.880 other parts of the world and South America for example, 0:18:26.119 --> 0:18:28.200 they don't want it to go away. They can't make 0:18:28.200 --> 0:18:30.520 a go away Beau. There'll be just so much illegal 0:18:30.560 --> 0:18:33.760 activity and violence and bloodshed. Do they sit there and 0:18:33.800 --> 0:18:35.479 say and they just write it off and say, well, 0:18:35.520 --> 0:18:37.760 we have to tolerate a certain amount of artisanal mining 0:18:37.880 --> 0:18:40.719 just to keep these people quiet and peaceful. Yeah, I mean, 0:18:40.800 --> 0:18:43.120 I think I can make it go away. Yeah, I think. 0:18:43.400 --> 0:18:46.320 Sometimes I'll say that, and sometimes they say, well, artismal 0:18:46.359 --> 0:18:49.520 mining can't exist. And it was funny I interviewed the 0:18:49.560 --> 0:18:51.639 governor at the time, and he basically said the same. 0:18:51.760 --> 0:18:53.600 He said both of those things in the same interview. 0:18:53.800 --> 0:18:56.240 So I don't think they really understood how to deal 0:18:56.280 --> 0:18:58.440 with this problem. And and it is, it's a very 0:18:58.520 --> 0:19:00.760 very complex issue. And I wouldn't say that I have 0:19:01.240 --> 0:19:03.520 I have the answers, but I just don't think it's 0:19:03.560 --> 0:19:07.160 being engaged with in a particularly robust manner. You also 0:19:07.200 --> 0:19:09.080 have to think about that in terms of, you know, 0:19:09.560 --> 0:19:12.760 the industrial minds which were brought many of them were 0:19:12.800 --> 0:19:15.600 brought through this guy Gutler who's now in the U S. Actions. 0:19:15.600 --> 0:19:19.560 There's actually Trump d sanctioned him for a bit who 0:19:19.600 --> 0:19:22.679 knows why, and then and then he got re sanctioned. 0:19:22.880 --> 0:19:26.199 And basically you have a system that relies on this 0:19:26.280 --> 0:19:30.200 corruption and those funds are not going back to the people, 0:19:30.720 --> 0:19:33.320 and then you have a situation in which, you know, 0:19:33.359 --> 0:19:35.160 the minds are sold to big Western companies, and big 0:19:35.160 --> 0:19:38.359 Western companies, you know, maybe don't participate directly in that, 0:19:38.440 --> 0:19:42.600 but they work with people who are certainly questionable. Actually 0:19:42.640 --> 0:19:44.720 it's not and forgive me a big Western companies has 0:19:44.760 --> 0:19:48.080 not entirely correct a lot of Chinese companies. Actually, what 0:19:48.119 --> 0:19:50.840 are the Chinese doing there? And how long have them in? Obviously, well, 0:19:50.840 --> 0:19:52.880