'Blood gold': Illegal miners devastating rainforests

How bad a threat is illegal gold mining to the world's rainforests? 

Mining moonscape in Sumatra, Indonesia (photo by William Laurance)

Have a look at these four short videos of illegal mining in the Brazilian Amazon, Peru, Ghana, and Indonesia.  They clearly show the devastation wrought by illegal miners.

Alarming videos like these raise several issues:

- Widespread invasions of the world's shrinking wildernesses illustrate how rapid population growth and poverty conspire to imperil natural environments and indigenous peoples

- A key impetus for rampant illegal (and legal) mining is the rising price of gold

- Illegal mining is often an organized criminal activity that has much wider corrupting influences on societies

- Increased enforcement is direly needed to protect parks, wilderness areas, and indigenous lands from illegal mining 

- Government officials can be pressured to focus effort on enforcement if the public knows about -- and decries -- the illegal mining crisis

In recent years we've heard often about the severe social and environmental costs of 'blood diamonds' and 'blood ivory'.  Clearly, it's time we started talking about 'blood gold' as well.