Gold

Smartphones, computers, televisions – electronic devices almost always contain gold. Yet the vast majority of this glittering raw material is still used in the manufacture of jewellery. What sparkles as a necklace around the neck, a brooch on a blouse or a wedding ring on a finger has first been extracted with great effort from mines, open-cast quarries and riverbeds, often using highly toxic chemicals.

Nowadays, extracting just one gramme of gold often produces 1,000 kilograms of waste rock. As long as the world market price remains high, the effort is worthwhile. The consequences for people and the environment are catastrophic in many places, for example in Peru: in this Latin American country, rainforest is being cleared – sometimes legally, sometimes illegally – the indigenous population is being forced to make way for new mines, and adventurers search for the big find in narrow tunnels without protective equipment. Corruption undermines the effectiveness of statutory regulation, whilst voluntary industry initiatives and ‘fair gold’ labels have so far brought little improvement.

Using the teaching materials on the topic of gold, pupils can discuss who, within the value chain from the mine to the end product, bears (joint) responsibility for improving social, environmental and economic conditions, and weigh up possible solutions to the risks in the gold sector.

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