Mozambique: Environmental protection in the mining of Schwersand
Where coconut palms and apple trees still grow, houses are still growing and cemeteries lie, a daughter of the raw material giant Rio Tinto wants to dred off heavy mineral sands. The population provides conditions - and is supported by Terre des Hommes.
Luisa Joaquim from Nhalicocoane believes in a better future: "Our children will have jobs, we will have schools and health stations, fluent water and electricity," announces the 53-year-old farmer on the village of the village under a large cashew.
The company Mutamba Mineral Sands (MMS) will take care of this. MMS is a daughter of the British-Australian raw material giant Rio Tinto and wants to dismantle heavy mineral sand where the village of Nhalicocoane has been standing so far. Specifically: zircon, rutil and ilmenit, also known as titanium iron.
The extract is to be shipped to China in the port of the capital Maputo and then via Richards Bay in South Africa. There the minerals are mainly used in the production of high -quality colors and porcelain glazes. MMS has a license for 25,000 hectares of land around 500 kilometers north of the capital Maputo - on the fish -rich and popular coast of Inhambane. In the first phase, the company wants to check the profitability of the project on 261 hectares.
Thousands of people are affected, because where the sand is to be dredged, their fields, their cemeteries and their villages are located. Almost all lives from small farm agriculture. You harvest cassava, beans, corn, salad, coconuts, mangoes or apple stones and hold a few chickens. The area is poor. The expectations of the economic upswing from the weight of the heavy sand are correspondingly high. In Nhalicocoane, the families have clear ideas of the new village to which they are to be relocated.
"We demand that there are electricity, fluent water, a school and a market"
"We demand that there are electricity, fluent water, a school and a market," says Dercia Castro. "If all of this does not exist, we will not change." The cemeteries with the dead family members should also be taken away, which is important to people from Nhalicocoane. "You have to give me what I have here," says Dercia.
The 24-year-old belongs to the Nhalicocoane environmental club. It was launched by the Kuwuka JDA organization and - like six other environmental clubs in villages also affected - is supported by Terre des Hommes and the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). In the environmental clubs, young people discuss positive and negative aspects of the Schwersand mining, inform themselves about their rights, network and prepare for the public hearings that are prescribed according to international standards and take place regularly.
"Representatives of the village communities concerned take part in the hearings," says Zito Covane, who coordinates the terre of the Hommes project and the environmental clubs, "but they are not sufficiently informed and cannot really have a say. A technical specialist vocabulary that you cannot understand is used. In addition, the atmosphere is very intimidating: it is people from the government there, police, and various experts. Therefore, it is unlikely that they speak critically. ”Zito Covane, in particular, explains to young people in the environmental clubs, what the hearings are about, the risks of the low -sand mining and what rights they have. He encourages them to participate and fight for their interests and that of the village. When the project starts, they should be able to remind MMS of its promises.
"We shouldn't accept everything you do with us"
"Kuwuka Jda is at the side of the village community," says Julião Sikisse, the village director of Nhalicocoane. “They help us see what is good and what is not good. We should not accept everything you do with us and not say yes to everything. What is coming must even be better than what we have now. "
The aim of the radio communities and above all the young people is also the aim of the radio spots that Kuwuka JDA places in the municipal radio and which are regularly sent in the local language Bitonga and in Portuguese. The young people should learn to work for nature and their rights - both towards the company MMS and towards state institutions.
Because when it comes to reducing raw materials, promises are often not kept and the local population all too often has to accept the negative consequences such as ecological damage, while the profits are made by others. There are also numerous examples in Mozambique, which is number 142 out of 180 at the Transparency International Corruption Index. Influential politicians from the Frelimo ruling party (Frente de Libertação de Moçambique) have company shares and are happy to overlook it when taxes are not paid. The contribution of the growing raw material industry to state revenue in Mozambique therefore remains far below its possibilities.
"What good is a job if the environment is destroyed?"
"I was pretty nervous when I spoke to the hearing in Inhambane," admits the 20-year-old Artur. He also belongs to one of the environmental clubs, his village is called Madonga. Although - at least in the first phase - it should not be resettled, but is affected by the foreseeable environmental pollution. Artur fears dust, heavy goods traffic, accidents and vibrations that could damage the houses and pass snakes towards the village.
Nobody has said exactly what will happen to her village and fields from Madonga. They only observed that soil samples were removed in many places. Artur is worried: "Nobody knows whether nature recovers when the area is renatured," he points out. The main argument of sand mining supporters, the jobs to be expected about a hundred, does not accept: »What good is a job if the environment is destroyed? Then I come home and the air is bad. And when I open the window, exhaust gases come in, smoke and noise. The environment is more important to me than a workplace in mining. Maybe I have less money, but I live healthy. "
MMS still has no funding license. The environmental impact assessment that was paid by the company itself has too many weaknesses and ambiguities for the Frelimo government to wave through the project. Numerous risks are mentioned, but the conclusion is nevertheless: the promotion of sand can start, it has more positive than negative effects. The appraiser shows that this result is a courtesy to the client: at least it is possible to remedy the majority of the damage. The fertile top floor is stored, for example, to be put out again when MMS pulls off after 25 years.
Where will the more than 300 people from Nhalicocoane to be relocated to be relocated in the first phase? How high will the compensation for the destroyed fields and fruit trees be? Will the cemeteries be relocated despite the costs? Will a complete renaturation be possible? A lot is unclear, but the preparations for the gravity mining are already in full swing: trees have been felled, there are accommodations for the workers, a doctor and the so -called spiral sheader, a spiral slide that separates the mineral land from the rest by gravity.
To what extent the hopes of Luisa Joaquim, Dercia Castro and the other villagers meet jobs and a better life and to what extent - like so many before you - you only get the disadvantages of sand removal, while the profits are inserted by others, also depends on how well they can negotiate and MMS are reminiscent of its promises. The farmer Luisa Joaquim looks determined: "Our expectations are not overly high," she says. “You are our right. If MMS says no, we also say no. "