• The Global Mercury Treaty: Japan’s Chance or Shame
    Dec 29, 2012
    Mercury is an ancient metal rich in history, cloaked with mystery and power. It is liquid at room temperature, with a beautiful silver hue. The metal is used in industrial production, in medical and cosmetic products, and in small-scale gold mining.
  • End Child Labor in Gold Mines
    Nov 13, 2012
    In Tanzania, I met "Julius", a boy of about 13, who works in an artisanal gold mine. He told me he digs ore in pits more than 15 metres deep and mixes toxic mercury with ground ore to retrieve the gold. Once a pit collapsed and almost killed another boy, his friend. The work had made him feel "pain in the whole body."
  • New Unicef guidelines on children will fall flat without backing from business
    Mar 12, 2012
  • Gold’s image tarnished by child labour in mines
    Dec 22, 2011
    There has been a lot of debate about corporate social responsibility. But most gold traders I interviewed showed no concern about the use of child labour.
  • Take mercury out of children’s hands
    Nov 17, 2011
    Governments from around the world met in Nairobi, Kenya recently to negotiate an international treaty on mercury, under the auspices of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP). Mercury, the silvery liquid metal, known to many from old thermometers, is one of the most toxic substances on earth.