Blog Posts in Conflict Minerals
FAQs About Conflict Minerals Regulations
The recent passage of provisions on conflict minerals from eastern Congo in the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform Act has brought unprecedented attention to the linkages between trade in minerals crucial to electronics and other industries and the ongoing conflict in Congo. These provisions have been welcomed by the State Department, the Congolese government, a diverse coalition of NGOs, and by leading companies.
But the passage of the legislation also raises important questions about how it will be implemented, its potential unintended consequences, its linkages with other initiatives to curb resource-fueled conflict, and how it fits with wider peace-building efforts in the Congo. Alongside these important issues, there are ripples of discontent and complaints from various industry representatives about burdensome reporting requirements, and warnings about de facto boycotts on minerals sourced in the region and massive job losses causing increased instability.
To help put these concerns in context and provide more information about Enough’s approach to conflict minerals and peace in Congo, we’ve put together a set of frequently asked questions. Take a look, and let us know if you have more questions about conflict minerals regulations.
Click here to go to the conflict minerals regulation FAQs.
Photo: Tin ore (Sasha Lezhnev/ Grassroots Reconciliation Group)
A Long Path Toward Conflict Minerals Certification
When debating the merits of the argument for a more rigorous tracing and auditing system for conflict minerals originating in Congo, one need not look any further than Rwanda to understand the necessity. Rwanda has no large-scale mining industry, and several NGO and aid agency sources say a significant part of the country’s minerals exports—its largest export sector accounting for over 35 percent of total annual export earnings—are smuggled from Congo’s mineral-rich North Kivu province, which has strong social and economic links with elements of Rwandese society.
The Rwanda Geology and Mines Authority, or OGMIR, has touted a recent pilot project using scientific analysis of ore composition to certify the origin of conflict minerals as an “advanced…process of certifying mineral supply chains and upgrading mineral extraction to good practice standards universally accepted.” This initiative is not as helpful as the OGMIR makes it out to be. At best it is one step forward on a much longer path, but certainly not the final one. No evidence has been shown that microscopic analysis of ore composition would allow minerals sourced in Africa’s Great Lakes region to be traced back to the mine of origin—for starters, simply mixing ores from various locations could confound the whole process. A more comprehensive certification process is necessary to ensure that minerals exported from countries like Rwanda are not originating from militarized mines in eastern Congo.
Smuggling of materials from eastern Congo to neighboring countries like Rwanda for export is all too easy. The current U.S. legislation is also just one step toward certification of conflict-free products and a minerals trade that benefits the Congolese people. Achieving the transparency necessary for certification will require more than a handful of companies in Rwanda “volunteering” to have their mineral ore audited for composition. Input from a combination of companies, governments, and consumers to create a transparent, rigorous, and credible system of certification that is able to trace through both human and scientific systems is necessary. We have suggested starting with a framework of tracing, auditing, and certifying for companies and countries to prove their mineral supplies are conflict-free.
As the situation exists today, there is no way governments in the Great Lakes region can ensure that all conflict minerals originating from any respective country are “accounted for” and “mined with international good practice,” as OGMIR suggests its pilot program would do. We have no legitimate method of knowing for sure whether these minerals exported from neighboring countries like Rwanda passed through the hands of armed groups in Congo or whether they came from another source. That is why we need more definitive proof from a transparent trace, audit, and certify system.
Through the recently passed U.S. legislation, the Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, has nine months to write regulations regarding the disclosure of conflict minerals from the Congo and its adjoining countries. From that point, companies would then have almost an entire year to meet their first reporting requirements, putting the initial reporting period sometime around January 2012. In addition, the U.S. government, international NGOs, and partners from the region have been working to establish certification schemes for the past two years. The writing has clearly been on the wall that regulatory reform was on the way. Therefore, it is difficult to argue, as the OGMIR has, that the timing for implementation is sudden and was not clearly studied to avoid hurting the mining industry in the region.
Countries such as Rwanda are inexorably linked to the conflict minerals trade in eastern Congo. It is commendable that such nations are enthusiastic about moving towards a legitimate certification system for mineral extraction in the region. However, it is critical that input be taken from all stakeholders, and that rigor and transparency drive any process.
Photo: Gold mining in eastern Congo. (Reuters)
5 Best Stories You Might Have Missed This Week
Here at Enough, we often swap emails with interesting articles and feature stories that we come across in our favorite publications and on our favorite websites. We wanted to share some of these stories with you as part of our effort to keep you up to date on what you need to know in the world of anti-genocide and crimes against humanity work.
Marking the fifth anniversary of the sudden death of southern Sudan rebel leader Dr. John Garang, Alan Boswell pondered the question ‘what if?’ Despite the brutal North-South civil war that left two million people dead, the charismatic leader was able to rally southerners around the idea of a New Sudan—still united but democratic and secular. As the country heads toward a likely division, it’s hard not to wonder how things might have been different had Garang survived to fill his role as Sudan’s vice president.
NPR’s Morning Edition ran this excellent feature story by Trevor Snapp from Western Equatoria state in southern Sudan. Snapp described the human toll of attacks by the Lord’s Resistance Army, which has terrorized the region nearly without challenge by the southern Sudanese army. In the absence of an effective military, men and boys known as the Arrow Boys have taken up arms to defend themselves. But now the local government is in a tricky position: practically-speaking, the Arrow Boys play an indispensable role, but what will become of them once the LRA leaves the area?
For three days this week, President Obama hosted 120 young African leaders for an unprecedented summit in Washington, D.C. Here’s a highlights reel with footage from their meetings with President Obama and Secretary Clinton, and around the city, commenting on the importance of bringing young people together. Enough had an opportunity to meet many of the delegates at a gathering hosted by the State Department and the Newseum, and as one young woman from Burundi said to me, “Can you imagine what it is to come to America for the very first time and meet President Obama the next day? I do not have the words to say how that felt.” A remarkable event.
Here’s something you don’t see every day: U.S.-based, grassroots activism for Somalia. The Washington Post carried this piece about two D.C.-area high school students who have started an online curriculum program for students in Somalia. The children of Somali immigrants, the teens explain the motivation for their project, called “Wake Up Somalia”:
"Our whole lives, we've always had a connection with our home country, even though we weren't born there," said Sahnun [Mohamud], a rising senior.
Added Bashir [Warsame]: "We started to look at different ways to help. We looked at different [nonprofit organizations], but they didn't have anything with the end product we were looking for, which was to educate."
Many news outlets have been angling to talk to Run for Congo Women founder Lisa Shannon lately, and she and Enough’s own David Sullivan scored a homerun this week with their appearance on the nationally syndicated NPR program “On Point with Tom Ashbrook.” Questions from callers and host Jane Clayson sparked an interesting discussion and encouragingly, many people called or wrote in to ask how they could get involved.
Conflict Minerals on the Blogs: Correcting Misperceptions
In the two weeks since President Obama signed the conflict minerals bill – a landmark moment after two years of advocacy to press the U.S. government to address the issue – one corner of the blogosphere has been subsumed with posts pointing out the merits and the perceived flaws of the new law.
Let’s be clear: Congo is a vast country with an intricate history, and the current conflict in the Kivu provinces is among the most complex in the world. There is ample room to debate the relative importance of different drivers of the conflict, and the potential policy levers that might help contribute to peace. We welcome this conversation, in which we have been an active participant, both on the ground in eastern Congo and here in the United States.
But much of the criticism of our work on conflict minerals implies otherwise, suggesting that activism around the U.S. legislation and the wider campaign portrays the U.S. bill as sufficient to break the links between illicit resource trafficking and violence in Congo, and that breaking that link would be sufficient to end the conflict. This is simply inaccurate.
As we have stated in multiple strategy papers, blog posts, op-eds, and other publications, Enough views conflict minerals as a major driver of conflict in eastern Congo, which has other important driving factors. Addressing the minerals trade is particularly important because until recently it was neglected, disregarded by diplomats and policymakers in negotiations and peace talks. Also, international advocacy on conflict minerals can be more effective than on other issues in the conflict, because of the international dimension of the trade. There is a limited extent to which the United States government can influence land reform issues in Masisi territory, for example. But we are the ultimate consumers of Congo’s tin, tantalum, tungsten, and gold, and that is a lever worth using. But in our research, policy positions, and advocacy, we continue to support a holistic approach to peace in Congo that incorporates the economic dimensions of the conflict into a comprehensive policy.
This is not a particularly controversial analysis. Among others it has been endorsed by the U.N. Security Council, the G8, the U.S. State Department, the European Parliament, the Catholic Church in Congo and the United States, the Congolese government, regional governments (pdf), a slew of NGOs, and even a few honest-to-goodness experts. Our analysis is roughly consistent with most of the U.N. Group of Experts reports on Congo.
Some criticisms of this campaign have implied that this issue is at odds with the views of Congolese people and civil society organizations. Again, this is simply false. We tend to be skeptical of anyone who tries to speak on behalf of “the Congolese people” because Congo’s population is far too vast, diverse, and opinionated to be reduced to a talking point. Local perspectives on conflict minerals, as on other contentious issues, vary dramatically. Certainly there are groups that differ with us, and whose constructive criticism we do appreciate. But the pivotal role of the Catholic Church in Congo in lobbying on behalf of the legislation, and recent statements of support from major Congolese human rights organizations, such as African Association for the Defense of Human Rights, demonstrate ample Congolese support for this effort.
It is true that Enough’s advocacy efforts have given disproportionate attention to conflict minerals over the past year. As an organization focused on the U.S. response to mass atrocities, we constantly grapple with the challenge of finding advocacy asks that will resonate with activists across the United States, while also ensuring that our reporting on the conflict is firmly grounded in field research and in line with the findings of respected Congo experts. Of course, it isn’t possible to pack volumes of context and nuance into an advocacy call-out on Facebook, but our policy papers consistently address the numerous, deep-seated issues that fuel conflict in eastern Congo.
There are numerous other pressure points that the international community should help address, from security sector reform to justice and accountability, from ensuring a more transparent process for returning refugees, to devising a more effective strategy to dismantle the FDLR and to demobilize Congo’s many militia groups.
But the conflict minerals issue resonates with a potent group of actors in the United States, namely, advocates and concerned consumers who do not want their purchases to fund armed groups in Congo, a handful of dedicated members of Congress and leaders in the Obama administration who see a lasting solution to the Congo conflict as part of their personal priorities and legacies, and increasingly, leaders in the electronics industry itself, which is responding to the moral and consumer pressure to take on this issue.
This growing attention in the United States corresponds with increasing focus on the issue from within Congo. As Congolese Ambassador Faida Mitifu emphasized in a recent event in Washington, “We can all work together on this; we are partners. NGOs, media, governments, the government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The [Congolese] government has been losing so much in terms of revenue because it doesn’t control the flow of these illegal mining processes.” Moreover, there is growing space for dialogue on this issue in North and South Kivu, where civil society groups, the private sector, and government officials have begun a process of collaboration on how to put the region’s resources to use to better benefit its people. This confluence of interests in addressing conflict minerals in Congo provides a rare opportunity to confront the profit motive fueling the conflict for more than a decade.
So how do we expect to see this new law change the calculations of those currently benefiting from the minerals trade? The Security and Exchange Commission is just beginning to work out the details of how the conflict minerals law will be implemented, and industry groups are lobbying hard to see that the SEC regulations carry as little weight as possible, by narrowly defining, for instance, which companies have to report on their activities in eastern Congo. But if the regulation is written to appropriately include the thousands of companies that depend upon these materials to manufacture electronics, jewelry and other products, we believe it could create the ‘demand shock' necessary to change the present dynamics on the ground in Congo. Supply chain due diligence is a means of exerting commercial leverage on the elites who are currently benefiting from the minerals trade.
Our researchers in Congo have seen a shift since conflict minerals became a hot topic. At stops all along the supply chain in central Africa, the risk that companies will source elsewhere provides a powerful incentive to clean up the trade. Complying with independent audits and monitoring would impose some checks and balances on the trade, creating costs for continuing to do business with the worst actors on the ground and helping encourage reform. For details on how reduced revenue from the minerals trade might affect the behavior of armed groups – and ideas for heading off this potential blowback – this concept note (pdf) by Congo experts Jason Stearns and Steve Hege is recommended reading.
Of course, in the short-term, some companies will choose to pull their business out of Congo altogether. This is not our objective, but it is a serious issue. Miners will lose jobs, and the main risk is that ex-combatants will rejoin militias. Here’s where we get back to the point that addressing conflict minerals trade has to be part of a much broader strategy, one that will span many years and focus on spurring broad economic recovery, promoting good governance and cracking down on corruption, and revitalizing peacebuilding efforts. In particular, companies that have long benefited from Congo’s cheap mineral trade should work with donors to create a fund dedicated to supporting alternative livelihoods for miners.
We’re putting the finishing touches on some Frequently Asked Questions to respond to the inquiries that have come in with the passage and signing of the new conflict minerals bill. We hope this document will provide additional clarification on topics that this already-very-long blog post was only able to touch on. There are other products in the pipeline that will hone in on the trade in specific metals, as well as others that more broadly assess the U.S. policy in Congo, and of course, we’ll be acutely tuned in to the process by which the Securities and Exchange Commission will promulgate the new law.
Please stay tuned, and get in touch if the strategy behind our methods seems unclear so that we can clarify via Enough Said or offline. This is a pivotal moment, when increased public awareness, constructive pressure on corporations, unlikely partnerships, and high-profile champions in Kinshasa, Washington, and other capitals could come together to generate smart, comprehensive policies that truly change the game on the ground in Congo.
Photo: Tin ore (Grassroots Reconciliation Group/Sasha Lezhnev)
Congo Dispatch: Conflict Minerals Windfall for Armed Groups
Enough researcher Fidel Bafilemba filed a new field dispatch today from Goma that describes the daily evidence of the excesses – particularly startling in contrast to the widespread poverty – that the conflict minerals trade fosters among the ranks of armed groups in eastern Congo. He also offers a valuable report out on how news of the new conflict minerals law in the United States is being received in Congo. Here’s an insightful passage:
This legislation was welcomed by the Congolese government, and Minister of Information Lambert Mende called it a “noble initiative” – an opinion largely shared by civil society groups here in Goma, who called upon the European Union, and especially Belgium, to follow in the United States’ footsteps. The Congolese Catholic Church also issued a statement welcoming the bill. But Congolese civil society groups also have understandable questions about how the bill will be implemented, what measures will be taken to avoid unintended consequences, and how they can participate in the process. It will be important to make sure that information flows freely between Congolese and international organizations as implementation of the legislation moves forward.
During meetings with individual members of the mining dealers’ association in Goma and with some officials who wanted to remain anonymous, opinions were divided about the potential impact of the U.S. legislation on the business climate, employment, and security in Congo. Some think that demanding that multinational companies comply with such requirements in a country as vast as Congo—and where such a dense web of local and foreign militias, army units, and political and administrative authorities collude in minerals trafficking—could trigger a de facto boycott of Congolese minerals. The worst-case scenario would be where miners who lose their livelihoods join up with armed groups for lack of an alternative. However it is important to remember that many of the same traders who worry about a boycott are those that have made fortunes from the militarized trade during the past decade.
Click here to read Fidel’s full field dispatch.
