Empty the Land · Episode 8 of 12 · 24 min
Gold, Coal, and Nickel: How Mining Empties Indigenous Land
Extraction rarely needs to march anyone anywhere. It makes the land unlivable and calls the departure voluntary. The episode follows illegal gold mining in Brazil's Yanomami territory, coal expansion in India's Hasdeo Aranya forest, decades of dispossession around West Papua's Grasberg mine and the restarted Fénix nickel mine in Guatemala.
Who's who
- Davi Kopenawa+1 more episodeYanomami shaman and spokesman who led the campaign for demarcation
- Jair Bolsonaro+1 more episodeBrazilian president under whom the second invasion peaked
- Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva+1 more episodeBrazilian president who declared the Yanomami health emergency in 2023
Where it happens
- Yanomami Territory, Brazil+1 more episodeInvaded by about 20,000 illegal gold miners in 2019-22
- Hasdeo Aranya, Chhattisgarh, IndiaForest of Adivasi communities facing coal expansion
- Grasberg mine, West Papua, IndonesiaGold and copper mine on Amungme and Kamoro land
- Raja Ampat, West Papua, IndonesiaArchipelago facing nickel operations
- El Estor, Guatemala+1 more episodeFénix nickel mine restarted over Q'eqchi' objections
Timeline
- 1967Freeport signs its Contract of Work with Indonesia for Grasberg's Ertsberg deposit
- 1992Yanomami territory demarcated after the first gold rush
- January 2023Lula declares a health emergency in Yanomami territory
- October 2024Police baton-charge Hasdeo villagers resisting tree felling
- November 2024Federal operation clears most illegal mining from Munduruku lands
- 2026Fénix nickel mine restarts; about 7,000 miners remain in Yanomami land
Still debated
Miner counts are estimates because clandestine populations cannot be censused, and many miners are poor laborers fronting for financiers. In Hasdeo, the forgery findings come from a state tribal commission, and the companies and officials dispute them.
← PreviousEvicted for Conservation: The Maasai, the Batwa, and the OgiekNext →Soy, Palm Oil, and Sugarcane: The Farms That Erase Villages
Connected episodes in other series
Paying the Forest to StandThe Price of a Tonne · Episode 8Also features Jair Bolsonaro, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva
The Nickel Mine That Got Its Critics KilledBackyard Empire: The U.S. in Latin America · Episode 8
The 500-Year Crusade for Amazonian Souls: Jesuits, Pombal, and the UncontactedMissionaries: From Alaska to Patagonia · Episode 7Also features Davi Kopenawa