In Bolivia's Amazon tensions are rising over a boom in wildcat gold mining that is driving a surge in imports of mercury used to extract the precious metal and is sparking conflict between small-scale prospectors and local indigenous groups.
The landlocked South American nation has seen gold production spike in the last five years, with an important amount of that coming from artisanal miners, officials say. That has risen with the global gold price elevated in recent years.
During the trip in May Reuters saw signs everywhere along the river of mining machinery and heard explosions from mining operations. Requena showed Reuters a video of one recent visit when her boat had been attacked by a man throwing rocks.The rise in wildcat mining has seen Bolivia, a country of some 12 million people, become the world's top importer of mercury since 2019, according to the Observatory of Economic Complexity , which tracks global trade flows.
"Small scale mining activity and the use of mercury in the country has increased," Marcos Orellana, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on toxics and human rights, told Reuters.
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