Mining: the story on HearLore

Mining

The oldest known mine on the archaeological record is the Ngwenya Mine in Eswatini, which radiocarbon dating shows to be about 43,000 years old. At this site Paleolithic humans mined hematite to make the red pigment ochre, a discovery that fundamentally altered the trajectory of human history. Before the invention of agriculture or the wheel, these early miners were already engaging in complex extraction processes to create materials for body paint and ritualistic purposes. This ancient pursuit of color from the earth laid the groundwork for all future mining endeavors, proving that the desire to extract value from the ground is as old as humanity itself. The techniques used at Ngwenya were rudimentary but effective, utilizing simple tools to break down rock and extract the desired mineral. This early form of mining was not driven by profit in the modern sense, but by the need for cultural expression and the practical application of pigments in daily life. The legacy of these early miners is evident in the countless sites discovered across the globe, from the chalk areas of northern France to the greenstone quarries of the English Lake District. These early operations were often Neolithic in origin, dating back to between 4000 and 3000 BC, and they utilized shafts and galleries to follow seams of stone underground. The mines at Grimes Graves and Krzemionki are especially famous examples of this early industrial activity, showcasing the ingenuity of our ancestors who managed to extract resources from deep within the earth without the benefit of modern machinery. The social structure of these early mining communities was likely communal, with the extracted materials serving the needs of the entire group rather than a single individual. The transition from surface collection to deep underground mining marked a significant technological leap, one that would eventually lead to the development of entire civilizations dependent on the resources they could extract from the earth. The story of mining begins not with gold or silver, but with the red ochre that painted the faces of our ancestors, a testament to the enduring human drive to shape the world around them.

Empires Built On Stone

Ancient Egypt relied heavily on the extraction of minerals to fuel its monumental building projects and religious practices, with the gold mines of Nubia standing as among the largest and most extensive of any in the region. These mines were described by the Greek author Diodorus Siculus, who mentioned fire-setting as one method used to break down the hard rock holding the gold. Miners crushed the ore and ground it to a fine powder before washing the powder for the gold dust known as the dry and wet attachment processes. The Egyptians mined malachite at Maadi, using the bright green stones for ornamentations and pottery before expanding their operations to secure minerals like turquoise and copper from Wadi Maghareh. Between 2613 and 2494 BC, large building projects required expeditions abroad to the area of Wadi Maghareh in order to secure minerals and other resources not available in Egypt itself. Quarries for gypsum were found at the Umm el-Sawwan site, where gypsum was used to make funerary items for private tombs. Other minerals mined in Egypt from the Old Kingdom until the Roman Period included granite, sandstone, limestone, basalt, travertine, gneiss, galena, and amethyst. Mining in Egypt occurred in the earliest dynasties, with the gold mines of Nubia being a central part of the economy. The Romans later developed large-scale mining methods, especially the use of large volumes of water brought to the minehead by numerous aqueducts. The water was used for a variety of purposes, including removing overburden and rock debris, called hydraulic mining, as well as washing comminuted, or crushed, ores and driving simple machinery. The Romans used hydraulic mining methods on a large scale to prospect for the veins of ore, especially using a now-obsolete form of mining known as hushing. They built numerous aqueducts to supply water to the minehead, where the water was stored in large reservoirs and tanks. When a full tank was opened, the flood of water sluiced away the overburden to expose the bedrock underneath and any gold-bearing veins. The rock was then worked by fire-setting to heat the rock, which would be quenched with a stream of water. The resulting thermal shock cracked the rock, enabling it to be removed by further streams of water from the overhead tanks. The Roman miners used similar methods to work cassiterite deposits in Cornwall and lead ore in the Pennines. Sluicing methods were developed by the Romans in Spain in 25 AD to exploit large alluvial gold deposits, the largest site being at Las Medulas, where seven long aqueducts tapped local rivers and sluiced the deposits. The Romans also exploited the silver present in the argentiferous galena in the mines of Cartagena, Linares, Plasenzuela and Azuaga, among many others. Spain was one of the most important mining regions, but all regions of the Roman Empire were exploited. In Great Britain the natives had mined minerals for millennia, but after the Roman conquest, the scale of the operations increased dramatically, as the Romans needed Britannia's resources, especially gold, silver, tin, and lead. Roman techniques were not limited to surface mining. They followed the ore veins underground once opencast mining was no longer feasible. At Dolaucothi they stoped out the veins and drove adits through bare rock to drain the stopes. The same adits were also used to ventilate the workings, especially important when fire-setting was used. At other parts of the site, they penetrated the water table and dewatered the mines using several kinds of machines, especially reverse overshot water-wheels. These were used extensively in the copper mines at Rio Tinto in Spain, where one sequence comprised 16 such wheels arranged in pairs, and lifting water about. They were worked as treadmills with miners standing on the top slats. Many examples of such devices have been found in old Roman mines and some examples are now preserved in the British Museum and the National Museum of Wales.

What is the oldest known mine on the archaeological record?

The oldest known mine on the archaeological record is the Ngwenya Mine in Eswatini, which radiocarbon dating shows to be about 43,000 years old. Paleolithic humans mined hematite at this site to make the red pigment ochre for body paint and ritualistic purposes.

When did the Romans develop large-scale hydraulic mining methods?

The Romans developed large-scale mining methods including hydraulic mining and hushing after the 1st century AD, with sluicing methods specifically developed in Spain in 25 AD. They used aqueducts to supply water to mineheads to remove overburden and wash crushed ores.

What was the silver crisis of 1465 in medieval mining?

The silver crisis of 1465 occurred when all mines had reached depths at which the shafts could no longer be pumped dry with the available technology. This crisis forced changes in the social structure of society and the spread of mineral extraction from central Europe to England.

How many miners died in the Courrières mine disaster?

The Courrières mine disaster involved the death of 1,099 miners in Northern France on the 10th of March 1906. This event was Europe's worst mining accident and was surpassed only by the Benxihu Colliery accident in China on the 26th of April 1942.

What are the environmental impacts of tailings from ore mills?

Ore mills generate large amounts of waste called tailings, with 99 tons of waste generated per ton of copper and even higher ratios in gold mining. These tailings can be toxic and are most commonly dumped into ponds made from naturally existing valleys, leading to potential failures and ecological collapse.

The Iron And Gunpowder Revolution

Mining as an industry underwent dramatic changes in medieval Europe, with the early Middle Ages focused mainly on the extraction of copper and iron. Other precious metals were also used, mainly for gilding or coinage. Initially, many metals were obtained through open-pit mining, and ore was primarily extracted from shallow depths, rather than through deep mine shafts. Around the 14th century, the growing use of weapons, armour, stirrups, and horseshoes greatly increased the demand for iron. Medieval knights, for example, were often laden with up to of plate or chain link armour in addition to swords, lances and other weapons. The overwhelming dependency on iron for military purposes spurred iron production and extraction processes. The silver crisis of 1465 occurred when all mines had reached depths at which the shafts could no longer be pumped dry with the available technology. Although an increased use of banknotes, credit and copper coins during this period did decrease the value of, and dependence on, precious metals, gold and silver still remained vital to the story of medieval mining. Due to differences in the social structure of society, the increasing extraction of mineral deposits spread from central Europe to England in the mid-sixteenth century. On the continent, mineral deposits belonged to the crown, and this regalian right was stoutly maintained. But in England, royal mining rights were restricted to gold and silver by a judicial decision of 1568 and a law in 1688. England had iron, zinc, copper, lead, and tin ores. Landlords who owned the base metals and coal under their estates then had a strong inducement to extract these metals or to lease the deposits and collect royalties from mine operators. English, German, and Dutch capital combined to finance extraction and refining. Hundreds of German technicians and skilled workers were brought over; in 1642 a colony of 4,000 foreigners was mining and smelting copper at Keswick in the northwestern mountains. Use of water power in the form of water mills was extensive. The water mills were employed in crushing ore, raising ore from shafts, and ventilating galleries by powering giant bellows. Black powder was first used in mining in Selmecbánya, Kingdom of Hungary in 1627. Black powder allowed blasting of rock and earth to loosen and reveal ore veins. Blasting was much faster than fire-setting and allowed the mining of previously impenetrable metals and ores. The use of Firesetting in the Granite Quarries of South India was documented by Paul T. Craddock. In 1762, one of the world's first mining academies was established in the same town there. The widespread adoption of agricultural innovations such as the iron plowshare, as well as the growing use of metal as a building material, was also a driving force in the tremendous growth of the iron industry during this period. Inventions like the arrastra were often used by the Spanish to pulverize ore after being mined. This device was powered by animals and used the same principles used for grain threshing. Much of the knowledge of medieval mining techniques comes from books such as Biringuccio's De la pirotechnia and probably most importantly from Georg Agricola's De re metallica published in 1556. These books detail many different mining methods used in German and Saxon mines. A prime issue in medieval mines, which Agricola explains in detail, was the removal of water from mining shafts. As miners dug deeper to access new veins, flooding became a very real obstacle. The mining industry became dramatically more efficient and prosperous with the invention of mechanically- and animal-driven pumps.

The Global Gold Rush

Gold and coal mining started in Australia and New Zealand in the 19th century, with nickel becoming important in the economy of New Caledonia. In Fiji, in 1934, the Emperor Gold Mining Company Ltd. established operations at Vatukoula, followed in 1935 by the Loloma Gold Mines, N.L., and then by Fiji Mines Development Ltd. These developments ushered in a mining boom, with gold production rising more than a hundred-fold, from 931.4 oz in 1934 to 107,788.5 oz in 1939, an order of magnitude then comparable to the combined output of New Zealand and Australia's eastern states. Mining in the United States became widespread in the 19th century, and the United States Congress passed the General Mining Act of 1872 to encourage mining of federal lands. As with the California Gold Rush in the mid-19th century, mining for minerals and precious metals, along with ranching, became a driving factor in the U.S. Westward Expansion to the Pacific coast. With the exploration of the West, mining camps sprang up and expressed a distinctive spirit, an enduring legacy to the new nation. Gold Rushers would experience the same problems as the Land Rushers of the transient West that preceded them. Aided by railroads, many people traveled West for work opportunities in mining. Western cities such as Denver and Sacramento originated as mining towns. When new areas were explored, it was usually the gold and then silver that were taken into possession and extracted first. Other metals would often wait for railroads or canals, as coarse gold dust and nuggets do not require smelting and are easy to identify and transport. In the early colonial history of the Americas, native gold and silver was quickly expropriated and sent back to Spain in fleets of gold- and silver-laden galleons, the gold and silver originating mostly from mines in Central and South America. Turquoise dated at 700 AD was mined in pre-Columbian America, in the Cerillos Mining District in New Mexico, an estimate of about 15,000 tons of rock had been removed from Mt. Chalchihuitl using stone tools before 1700. In 1727 Louis Denys sieur de La Ronde took command of Fort La Pointe at Chequamegon Bay, where natives informed him of an island of copper. La Ronde obtained permission from the French crown to operate mines in 1733, becoming the first practical miner on Lake Superior; seven years later, mining was halted by an outbreak between Sioux and Chippewa tribes. In the early 20th century, the gold and silver rush to the western United States also stimulated mining for coal as well as base metals such as copper, lead, and iron. Areas in modern Montana, Utah, Arizona, and later Alaska became predominant suppliers of copper to the world, which was increasingly demanding copper for electrical and household goods. Canada's mining industry grew more slowly than did the United States due to limitations in transportation, capital, and U.S. competition; Ontario was the major producer of the early 20th century with nickel, copper, and gold. Meanwhile, Australia experienced the Australian gold rushes and by the 1850s was producing 40% of the world's gold, followed by the establishment of large mines such as the Mount Morgan Mine, which ran for nearly a hundred years, Broken Hill ore deposit, and the iron ore mines at Iron Knob. After declines in production, another boom in mining occurred in the 1960s. In the early 21st century, Australia remains a major world mineral producer.

The Modern Industrial Machine

In the early 21st century, a globalized mining industry of large multinational corporations has arisen, with peak minerals and environmental impacts becoming a major concern. Different elements, particularly rare-earth minerals, have begun to increase in demand as a result of new technologies. In 2023, 8.5 billion metric tons of coal were extracted from the Earth's crust. However, as the global economy transitions away from fossil fuels and toward a more sustainable future, the demand for metals is set to skyrocket. Between 2022 and 2050, an estimated 7 billion metric tons of metals will need to be extracted. Steel will account for the largest portion of this total at 5 billion tons, followed by aluminum at 950 million tons, copper at 650 million tons, graphite at 170 million tons, nickel at 100 million tons, and other metals. Notably, the energy expenditure required to extract these metals will soon surpass that of coal mining, highlighting the growing importance of sustainable metal extraction practices. Mining techniques can be divided into two common excavation types: surface mining and sub-surface mining. Today, surface mining is much more common, and produces, for example, 85% of minerals in the United States, including 98% of metallic ores. Targets are divided into two general categories of materials: placer deposits, consisting of valuable minerals contained within river gravels, beach sands, and other unconsolidated materials; and lode deposits, where valuable minerals are found in veins, in layers, or in mineral grains generally distributed throughout a mass of actual rock. Both types of ore deposit, placer or lode, are mined by both surface and underground methods. Some mining, including much of the rare earth elements and uranium mining, is done by less-common methods, such as in-situ leaching. This technique involves digging neither at the surface nor underground. The extraction of target minerals by this technique requires that they be soluble, e.g., potash, potassium chloride, sodium chloride, sodium sulfate, which dissolve in water. Some minerals, such as copper minerals and uranium oxide, require acid or carbonate solutions to dissolve. Explosives have been used in surface mining and sub-surface mining to blast out rock and ore intended for processing. The most common explosive used in mining is ammonium nitrate. Between 1870 and 1920, in Queensland Australia, an increase in mining accidents lead to more safety measures surrounding the use of explosives for mining. In the United States of America, between 1990 and 1999, about 22.3 billion kilograms of explosives were used in mining quarrying and other industries. Moreover, coal mining used 66.4%, nonmetal mining and quarrying 13.5%, metal mining 10.4%, construction 7.1%, and all other users 2.6%. Heavy machinery is used in mining to explore and develop sites, to remove and stockpile overburden, to break and remove rocks of various hardness and toughness, to process the ore, and to carry out reclamation projects after the mine is closed. Bulldozers, drills, explosives and trucks are all necessary for excavating the land. In the case of placer mining, unconsolidated gravel, or alluvium, is fed into machinery consisting of a hopper and a shaking screen or trommel which frees the desired minerals from the waste gravel. The minerals are then concentrated using sluices or jigs. Large drills are used to sink shafts, excavate stopes, and obtain samples for analysis, and to extract natural gas. Trams are used to transport miners, minerals and waste. Lifts carry miners into and out of mines, and move rock and ore out, and machinery in and out, of underground mines. Huge trucks, shovels and cranes are employed in surface mining to move large quantities of overburden and ore. Processing plants use large crushers, mills, reactors, roasters and other equipment to consolidate the mineral-rich material and extract the desired compounds and metals from the ore.

The Cost Of Extraction

Safety has long been a concern in the mining business, especially in sub-surface mining. The Courrières mine disaster, Europe's worst mining accident, involved the death of 1,099 miners in Northern France on the 10th of March 1906. This disaster was surpassed only by the Benxihu Colliery accident in China on the 26th of April 1942, which killed 1,549 miners. Although mining today is substantially safer than it was in previous decades, mining accidents still occur. Government figures indicate that around 5,000 Chinese miners die in accidents each year, while other reports have suggested a figure as high as 20,000. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, there are safety concerns raised for both those who work in the mines and those who live around the city. Workers are usually seen with a mustard-colored powder that turned out to be dried sulfuric acid, which they use in the mine to process the mineral ores. Surrounding the mine, there is a small stream of foul, sludgy water that passes beneath a bridge next to the fence. Around the mine, biomonitoring studies of metal exposure show that the levels found in Kinshasa remain above the CDC reference value and constitute a public health concern, and that subjects living close to mines or metal-processing industries have higher urinary concentrations of various metals than those living further away, revealing an absence of a national policy to control and prevent exposure to harmful chemicals. In the mines, specifically at the Tenke Fungurume mine, there were hundreds of thousands of people who engaged in the feverish excavation of cobalt in medieval conditions. These workers were locals who worked for two dollars, roughly one day's income. In addition, the rates of schistosomiasis, a mining related disease endemic to DRC, were found to be higher among mining workers than in the total population, indicating harmful long-term impacts for the workers. In South Africa, issues are similar to DRC. Miners are exposed to silica dust, which increases the risk of pulmonary tuberculosis, with a tuberculosis rate of over 1,000 per 100,000. Mine shafts themselves are crowded and poorly-ventilated, but so are hostels where over a dozen men can share a small room. These conditions are highly conducive to infection; the rate of recurrent tuberculosis in a recent South African prospective cohort of 600 miners was about 8 per 100 person-years, which increases the risk of tuberculosis spreading in both mining and living locations. Past the mines, the extraction of minerals often leads to the disruption of ecosystems, polluting water sources, and degrading habitats including cultural heritage critical for the livelihoods of people. Mining accidents continue worldwide, including accidents causing dozens of fatalities at a time such as the 2007 Ulyanovskaya Mine disaster in Russia, the 2009 Heilongjiang mine explosion in China, and the 2010 Upper Big Branch Mine disaster in the United States. Mining has been identified by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health as a priority industry sector in the National Occupational Research Agenda to identify and provide intervention strategies regarding occupational health and safety issues. The Mining Safety and Health Administration was established in 1978 to work to prevent death, illness, and injury from mining and promote safe and healthful workplaces for US miners. Since its implementation in 1978, the number of miner fatalities has decreased from 242 miners in 1978 to 24 miners in 2019. There are numerous occupational hazards associated with mining, including exposure to rockdust which can lead to diseases such as silicosis, asbestosis, and pneumoconiosis. Gases in the mine can lead to asphyxiation and have risk of ignition. Mining equipment can generate considerable noise, putting workers at risk for hearing loss. Cave-ins, rock falls, and exposure to excess heat are also known hazards. The current NIOSH Recommended Exposure Limit of noise is 85 dBA with a 3 dBA exchange rate and the MSHA Permissible Exposure Limit is 90 dBA with a 5 dBA exchange rate as an 8-hour time-weighted average. NIOSH has found that 25% of noise-exposed workers in Mining, Quarrying, and Oil and Gas Extraction have hearing impairment. The prevalence of hearing loss increased by 1% from 1991 to 2001 within these workers. Noise studies have been conducted in several mining environments. Stageloaders, shearers, auxiliary fans, continuous mining machines, and roof bolters represent some of the noisiest equipment in underground coal mines. Dragline oilers, dozer operators, and welders using air arcing were occupations with the highest noise exposures among surface coal miners. Coal mines had the highest hearing loss injury likelihood.

The Environmental And Human Toll

Ore mills generate large amounts of waste, called tailings. For example, 99 tons of waste is generated per ton of copper, with even higher ratios in gold mining because only 5.3 g of gold is extracted per ton of ore, a ton of gold produces 200,000 tons of tailings. As time goes on and richer deposits are exhausted and technology improves, this number is going down to 0.5 g and less. These tailings can be toxic. Tailings, which are usually produced as a slurry, are most commonly dumped into ponds made from naturally existing valleys. In 2000 it was estimated that 3,500 tailings impoundments existed, and that every year, 2 to 5 major failures and 35 minor failures occurred. For example, in the Marcopper mining disaster at least 2 million tons of tailings were released into a local river. In 2015, Barrick Gold Corporation spilled over 1 million liters of cyanide into a total of five rivers in Argentina near their Veladero mine. Since 2007 in central Finland, the Talvivaara Terrafame polymetal mine's waste effluent and leaks of saline mine water have resulted in ecological collapse of a nearby lake. Subaqueous tailings disposal is another option. The mining industry has argued that submarine tailings disposal, which disposes of tailings in the sea, is ideal because it avoids the risks of tailings ponds. The practice is illegal in the United States and Canada, but it is used in the developing world. The waste is classified as either sterile or mineralized, with acid generating potential, and the movement and storage of this material form a major part of the mine planning process. When the mineralised package is determined by an economic cut-off, the near-grade mineralised waste is usually dumped separately with view to later treatment should market conditions change and it becomes economically viable. Civil engineering design parameters are used in the design of the waste dumps, and special conditions apply to high-rainfall areas and to seismically active areas. Waste dump designs must meet all regulatory requirements of the country in whose jurisdiction the mine is located. It is also common practice to rehabilitate dumps to an internationally acceptable standard, which in some cases means that higher standards than the local regulatory standard are applied. In addition to the environmental impacts of mining processes, a prominent criticism pertaining to this form of extractive practice and of mining companies are the human rights abuses occurring within mining sites and communities close to them. Frequently, despite being protected by International Labor rights, miners are not given appropriate equipment to provide them with protection from possible mine collapse or from harmful pollutants and chemicals expelled during the mining process, work in inhumane conditions spending numerous hours working in extreme heat, darkness and 14 hour workdays with no allocated time for breaks. In addition, many of these legal structures disproportionally harm indigenous communities. Included within the human rights abuses that occur during mining processes are instances of child labor. These instances are a cause for widespread criticism of mining cobalt, a mineral essential for powering modern technologies such as laptops, smartphones and electric vehicles. Many of these cases of child laborers are found in locations such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Africa, the Philippines, Australia, and Brazil. Reports have risen of children carrying sacks of cobalt weighing 25 kg from small mines to local traders being paid for their work only in food and accommodation. A number of companies such as Apple, Google, Microsoft and Tesla have been implicated in lawsuits brought by families whose children were severely injured or killed during mining activities in Congo. In December 2019, 14 Congolese families filed a lawsuit against Glencore, a mining company which supplies the essential cobalt to these multinational corporations with allegations of negligence that led to the deaths of children or injuries such as broken spines, emotional distress and forced labor. There have also been instances of killings and evictions attributed to conflicts with mining companies. Almost a third of 227 murders in 2020 were of Indigenous peoples rights activists on the frontlines of climate change activism linked to logging, mining, large-scale agribusiness, hydroelectric dams, and other infrastructure, according to Global Witness. The relationship between indigenous peoples and mining is defined by struggles over access to land. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, there are issues with both evictions and lack of compensation. There are forced evictions taking place as companies that seek to expand industrial-scale copper and cobalt mining projects are wrecking lives and following protests, in 2019 Chemaf, the company responsible for the industrial mining projects, agreed to pay via the local authority US$1.5 million, but some former residents received as little as US$300. According to the US government report, corruption and official complicity in trafficking crimes remained significant concerns, impeding law enforcement and judicial action. Sources reported widespread complicity, including allegations government officials directly engaged in trafficking, helped facilitate the crime, and obstructed justice. Government officials accepted bribes to overlook labor abuses, including forced labor and the worst forms of child labor, in the mining sector. Perpetrators of sexual violence, including sex trafficking, were rarely held accountable; and security forces continued to sexually abuse and exploit victims, including children, with impunity. There is little information about what citizens of DRC are doing in retaliation. In South Africa, according to health scientist Brad Kistanasamy and their peers, their mineral resources have produced, and continue to produce, enormous economic wealth; yet decades of colonialism, apartheid, capital flight, and challenges in the neoliberal post-apartheid era have resulted in high rates of occupational lung disease and low rates of compensation for ex-miners and their families. According to Amnesty International, by the end of 2017, 111,166 miners had received compensation, of which 55,864 were for permanent lung impairment, and another 52,473 for tuberculosis, however 107,714 compensable claims remained unpaid. To address current led poisoning, these is a current class action by residents of Kabbe against the mining company Anglo American in South Africa. The claimants allege severe lead poisoning caused by mining operations in Kabbe. SALC and Amnesty International submit that the case represents a pivotal moment for corporate accountability and the rights of communities affected by transnational and transgenerational harm. In Australia, the Aboriginal Bininj said mining posed a threat to their living culture and could damage sacred heritage sites. Although Australia is one of the most profitable mining countries, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders have not shared in this bounty equitably, with social and economic disadvantage exacerbated where mining activity is the greatest. As of now, Australian restoration networks are still poorly articulated and not in the position to stimulate an inclusive sector aligned with democratic and participatory engagements with Indigenous Australians. In the Philippines, an anti-mining movement has raised concerns regarding the total disregard for indigenous communities' ancestral land rights. According to Geographic Scientist William Holden and their peers, those unfamiliar with indigenous culture may mistakenly believe that mining poses minimal risks, since indigenous peoples have little income or wealth to lose and suffer from high unemployment, when in reality such a view is incorrect because the wealth that supports the sustainability of their culture is found in institutions, environmental knowledge, local resources, and especially in land embellished with cultural meaning. Ifugao peoples' opposition to mining led a governor to proclaim a ban on mining operations in Mountain Province, Philippines. In Brazil, more than 170 tribes organized a march to oppose controversial attempts to strip back indigenous land rights and open their territories to mining operations. The United Nations Commission on Human Rights has called on Brazil's Supreme Court to uphold Indigenous land rights to prevent exploitation by mining groups and industrial agriculture. For issues such as gold mining and illegal mining, uniform law enforcement is required to prevent the waterbed effect, when fighting miners somewhere, they pop up elsewhere. The unhinged miners have not been hinged yet. In addition, gold trading laws need to be strengthened to ensure accountability for the illegal gold trade in the Amazon. Lack of Safety Enforcement is a major issue, as although South Africa has strong regulations to avoid potential mining impacts, lack of enforcement and corruption have been barriers to combating social and environmental injustices, leading to unsafe working conditions for many miners. In the DRC, more than half of the DRC's natural resource exports are not officially recorded because of tax evasion and state institutions' lack of governance capacity, and 90% of minerals come from artisanal miners, which are indigenous people. In Ghana, similar safety issues exist. This is because inadequate monitoring of the operations and lack of regulatory enforcement by the Minerals Commission of Ghana are major contributing factors to the environmental, safety and national security issues of the operations, implying a failure of enforcement from local authorities, similar to these other countries. Corporate Negligence and Lack of Regulation Towards Indigenous Peoples exist due to multiple factors such as colonial legacies, economic inequalities, global power imbalances, inadequate.