Illegal tin?
On May 15th Follow the Money published this article: “Nokia, Volkswagen and Ericsson: Major EU firms source tin from Indonesian company tainted by corruption” authors: Shabrina, Tom Walker and Ties Gijzel (@tiesgijzel.bsky.social)
tags: tin mining indonesia #timah #corruption #pollution environment #ecocide #smartphone fairphone
From Volkswagen, to Philips, to Nokia: major companies in the EU have recently sourced tin from an Indonesian company that has been embroiled in a major corruption case, an investigation shows.
The central question is to what extent tech companies use illegal or contaminated tin in their products, such as smartphones.
One of the discussed companies is Fairphone. Angela Jorns, head of impact innovation at smartphone company Fairphone, said that the current RMI (Responsible Minerals Initiative) process “is just not enough”.
Jorns:
“We need to go beyond the basic conflict mineral stuff,” she added. She said that while more than half of Fairphone’s tin comes from recycled sources, some of the rest could come from PT Timah.
She added that Fairphone is looking for ways to encourage mining regions to improve working conditions and reduce environmental damage.
The article contains also a significant video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ubNkdJzNijQ
The article is free for at most 24 hours. For a fresh link, drop me a line at harriebaken@protonmail.com. The Dutch version is from May 12th and can be found here.