Across Bolivia, even in protected areas recognized by the United Nations for their diversity of wildlife, more than 1,000 artisanal mining operations are razing trees, diverting waterways, and reshaping the land in their search for gold. While miners are making a living, though, they are also dispersing mercury through the air, water, and soil. Their use of mercury has helped propel Bolivia to become the world’s biggest importer of the toxic substance.
The Minamata Convention is a global treaty to protect human health and the environment from the effects of mercury, considered by the World Health Organization to be one of the top 10 chemicals of greatest public-health concern. The treaty is named for Minamata Bay, Japan, where industrial dumping of mercury in the 1950s and ’60s led to widespread birth defects, neurological…
Read the full article originally published at e360.yale.edu.