Our Exploding Need for Cobalt and Lithium Poses Major Threat to Great Apes in Africa
The demand for such minerals has exploded since the energy transition. Nickel, cobalt and lithium, we need them badly for batteries in electric cars and solar panels. In five years, the mineral market has doubled. The demand for lithium has even tripled. We get the stuff from South America, Australia and Africa, among other places. The world is largely dependent on Congo for cobalt. Nickel also comes to a considerable extent from southern Africa.
And there, mining poses a threat to the habitat of great apes, much more than previously thought, according to . The enormous demand for minerals is leading to large-scale deforestation, which is putting many animals in dire straits, including our closest relatives, the great apes.
Data from 17 countries
It is estimated that a third of the entire population – almost 180,000 gorillas, bonobos and chimpanzees – are threatened by mining. The actual impact may be even greater, because mining companies are not required to make biodiversity data public.
The researchers came to this conclusion after collecting data from mines in seventeen African countries. They looked up to 50 targeted industry database kilometres around them to include indirect effects, such as increased hunting, the construction of infrastructure and more people in general, which not only take away habitat but also increase the risk of diseases.
Thousands of chimpanzees in danger
Especially in West African countries such as Mali, Liberia and Sierra Leone, many great apes live in mining areas. The situation is ਸਧਾਰਨ ਸ਼ਬਦਾਂ ਵਿੱਚ, ਓਮਨੀ-ਚੈਨਲ ਕਈ worst in Guinea. More than 23,000 chimpanzees, or more than 80 percent of the total population, could be directly or indirectly threatened by mining.
