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Major Electronics Firms Support Ending Use of "Conflict Minerals"
tburton writes "The US House of Representatives yesterday released the Conflict Minerals Trade Act (HR 4128) to try and end the international trade of tungsten, tantalum and col-tan, the mining of which is accused of fueling violent rape and murder in eastern Congo. Since the very same minerals power the most popular consumer electronics from HP, Verizon, Nokia, RIM and Intel, the Information Technology Industry Council has quickly signed a statement of support. Advocacy groups are hopeful these commitments prove to be meaningful as consumers begin to question the end result of the supply chains powering their favorite gadget."
Is this of any surprise that the companies don't really care where their materials come from as long as they are getting what they want at a price they want?
Public exposure and "naming names" is the only way to have an effect on this behavior, both so people know the effect of buying a product from certain companies as well as making the companies fearful of the bad PR that will come from using such materials
-jon
I'm sure it be just like other conflict industries. We will care about it just long enough until our next purchase. The unwashed masses would buy products made of dead baby carcasses.
"No matter where you go, there you are." -- Buckaroo Banzai
The fighting is about politics, not minerals. This will just make everyone in the region poorer. The minerals will continue to come out albeit at a reduced rate while yet another layer of criminal politicians seize the opportunity to enrich themselves by falsifying the documents necessary to get the stuff on the legal market.
This is just more feelgood crap from the assholes in Washington.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
This will work just as well as all of those useless "conflict diamond" resolutions that have accomplished nothing more than forcing DeBeers to launder its African blood diamonds through its "mines" in Canada.
The big miners will "discover" mines in some "friendly" country and just launder the stuff through them, just like they have done with diamonds.
*sigh*
How ironic that we than ask China to supply the same minerals who has similar Human rights abuses.. US House of Representatives ..palm to face..
Fred Grott(aka shareme) http://mobilebytes.wordpress.com
While not an especially great book, I got something of a picture of Eastern Congo from reading Tim Butcher's Blood River earlier this year. Though strangely little talked about, the entire region seems truly hell on earth, beyond any of the war zone or famished village you see on television. What I found interesting was that the materials from this region are transported in the backs of trucks to South Africa and only then processes, and the people mining these substances and transporting the excavated material get paid almost nothing for what is in later stages a treasure (and are frequently robbed on the way with it.)
We all know that banning the use of marijuana, cocaine, and other naturally-occurring drugs helped de-escalate violence.
The banning of these conflict minerals simply means that you'll leave former miners without jobs, and then they'll starve, as happened when we embargoed Iraq in the 90s, and Cuba over the last several decades. I honestly don't think there's ANY workable solution to the Congo problem.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
This is so DATED.... I work for a component manufacturer and NOBODY I repeat NOBODY has used anything from Congo for YEARS..... All the big boys demand that we prove the source of our Col-tan and provide a certified route to source Again this is the same as the Blood diamonds ... years to late !!!
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Hmmm, does anyone in Congress know what a fungible resource is?
Basically, there's no way to know if the tungsten in your product (or even in your supply chain) came from the Eastern Congo, or pretty much anywhere else.
If the price for "tungsten" goes up appreciably, then Eastern Congo "tungsten" will just show up indirectly from other sources.
We may not buy the stuff, but the Chinese will,
which means we will through a third party.... China!
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
To the "Turn over to the Chinese all the minerals in Africa" act. They'll take them, and they do not care one bit about which local regime is in charge today. They go out of their way all the time to state they have no desire to interfere in local politics, they just want the business/raw materials.
Oh, by the way, how about they ban petroleum products, fuels and plastics? Or do they want to claim petroleum doesn't come in huge part from regimes where human rights are routinely abused, where murders rapes torture and so on are common?
If the partner consents, it's not rape.
What about statutory rape, like the 18yrold with 17yrold cases?
And assisted suicide may as well be called "statutory murder", given the justification for outlawing it.
Rather than blaming a technology for requiring a particular mineral, or an industry for producing such products, does it not make more sense to blame the people killing and repressing populations over the minerals for any bloodshed? I'm sure that the assholes running their little war bands in the Congo will find something else to murder and repress over, just as tribal kingdoms in the region have for much of history.
"Because Science" is one step from "Because old book". Try "Because of my experiment testing my falsifiable assertion".
Seriously people, learn your grammatically-correct English!
"... to try and end ..." should be "... to try to end ...". Try is the verb, 'try to' is the proper way of using said verb in a sentence. Otherwise, you're combining the two on the same subject.
I'm going to try international trade of tungsten and end the international trade of tungsten.
OR
I'm going to try to end the international trade of tungsten.