Conflict Minerals in Congo and Rwanda

Most of the minerals in our computers, phones, TVs, etc, come from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Tungsten, coltan, tin and gold are denominated conflict minerals because their illegal trade is used to fund the civil war in the DRC. A war nobody is really talking about as it has been going on for so long. A few years ago I joined a UN delegation to Rwanda and the DRC to evaluate the conflict minerals trade. The Dodd Frank Act on Conflict Minerals forced many companies to source from Congo. This was a de facto boycott where the poorest communities were the sufferers. The UN delegation went to Congo to evaluate the success of the closed supply chain project, whereby they wanted to demonstrate that you can source such minerals from the DRC in a responsible manner without the involvement of armed forces or illegal groups. I had the opportunity to visit tungsten and tantalum mines. Most of the mines are artisanal, the workers organised in cooperatives. Days are long, work is hard and pay is little. I hope these images speak for themselves.