Coltan Mining Facts

The western worlds reliance on mobile phones is known to be directly linked to the accelerating demise of at least 10 of Africa's primate species*, including the Eastern Lowland Mountain Gorilla.

Eighty percent of the world’s coltan reserves are located in Africa, with the majority of the deposits located within the Democratic Republic of Congo. This is the same location that hosts some of our world’s last remaining primate populations and the mining of this metallic ore is causing catastrophic impacts on endangered wildlife species such as the Mountain Gorilla (Gorilla beringei beringei) and the Eastern Lowland Gorilla (Gorilla beringei graueri). Coltan, short for columbite tantalite, is the principal source of tantalum, a rare and valuable metal in huge demand in today's high technology industries. Coltan is used to coat the capacitors in mobile phones, and despite the fact that it is illegal to mine for Coltan in the Congo, the mining continues on a large scale and coltan can fetch as much as $400 a kilogram. The mining of this commodity within the Congo River Basin, is contributing to forest loss and unrest in the region, and is accelerating the loss of Mountain Gorillas at an alarmingly fast rate.

Photo courtesy of Bernard Iyomi.

As the pristine forest is denuded for mining of coltan, roads are paved which expose the once protected gorilla populations to poaching, and many fall victim to the bush meat trade.

In 2004, it is estimated that over 10,000 people moved into the Kahuzi-Biega National Park to work in the illegal mining industry. Thousands of wildlife were being killed and sold as bush-meat to the miners and rebel armies that control the area. It is thought that an entire population of elephants have been wiped out of the area. In Kahuzi Biega National Park, more than fifty percent of the mountain gorilla population has been lost in the past five years, leaving the species on the brink of extinction.

The illegally mined coltan is often mined by people working for rebel army groups, dubbed by the Congolese as ‘tin soldiers’. The coltan is then filtered through a middle-man and moved across to Kigali, secretly called coltan-ville because of the wealth acquired by coltan. It is shipped out of the and purchased internationally, making it hard to track where the coltan has come from.

More than 800 million people around the world currently use mobile phones and that figure is growing daily as consumers get bombarded by advertising campaigns exhorting them to upgrade to the latest, most fashionable model. In Australia alone, it is estimated that there were 9 million new mobile phones sold in the last 12 months.

The average Australian typically upgrades their phones every 18-24 months It is estimated that there are more mobile phones in Australia than there are people. Each day in America, 426, 000 phones are retired.

Jane Goodall Institute, in conjunction with participating Zoos and Aquaria and Aussie Recycling program, have developed Australia’s first mobile phone recycling program to raise awareness of this crisis and offer people the chance to support in-situ primate conservation through the donation of their phones.

You can now help save Gorilla’s in Africa simply by donating your mobile phone! Each time your mobile phone rings, a tiny piece of metallic ore from Africa is making this call possible: coltan. The mining of this commodity within the Congo River Basin, is contributing to forest loss and unrest in the region, and is accelerating the loss of mountain gorillas at an alarmingly fast rate.

By donating your phone through the They’re Calling on You mobile phone recycling program you are:
• Diverting your phone from landfill
• Helping Melbourne Zoo raise money to support the Jane Goodall Institutes primate conservation work in Africa through the sale of refurbished phones and…
• Lessening the demand for coltan mining by providing the coltan coated capacitor in your old mobile phone a second life.

* Primate species effected by Poaching in the Kuhuzi – Biega National Park (list forwarded by Debby Cox and obtained from the DRC Pole Pole Foundation Report, 2005.)
- Gorilla beringei graueri
- Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii
- Papio anubius
- Papio cynocephalus
- Cercocebus albigena
- Cercocebus hamluni
- Cercocebus ascanius
- Cercocebus l’hoesti
- Cercocebus mitis
- Colubus polykomos ruwenzori

For further information please contact:
Rachel Lowry, Email rlowry@zoo.org.au