The Race for Raw Materials

2013-01-30

KIVU - Without fuel our cars will stop moving; it is something we all know and realise. Far less of our attention is aimed at raw materials. Unrightfully so, because without raw materials cars it would not even be possible to make cars. The average car contains about a mile of copper wire, copper that is mainly looked for in Africa.

Raf Custers crawls through the dust in Laayoune, treads on some toes in Kivu and sees one of the world's biggest mining giants tap electricity in South Africa. He tells an inconvenient tale about an economy that does not lead to development but that sponges off labour, nature and the South. About the ranking of Ernst&Young who call self-disposal of raw materials "the biggest risk for the mining business". About a sort of colonialism that you didn't think existed anymore.