Niger is a West African country which is labeled as one of the poorest in the world. It is a very dry country and does not have a lot of natural resources. But the country is very desirable due to the richness of its soil with uranium. Many industrialized countries are flocking to the country to be part of the exploiters of the uranium mines. France, through one of its mines companies the Cogema / Areva Company owns most of the mines. They extract uranium and send it to Europe where the mineral is enriched. This is not the (real) problem.
The most important problem is how the company insures the health of its workers and the local population in Niger. The slogan “Think Globally, Act Locally” advocated by social ecologists like Ernest Callenbach seems not the most spread idea in the global economy. The French NGO CRIIRAD, a Non Governmental Organization, working on radioactivity issues conducted research in Niger. The NGO conclusions are frightening. Many mine workers are not well protected against radioactivity and the ineluctable result is the many sicknesses they suffer from. In the local hospital financed by Cogema, medical attitudes are the least unethical: doctors knowingly cover up the diagnostic of their patients when they know the sickness they are suffering from is caused by their exposure to uranium. They will come up with totally made up diagnoses such as HIV/AIDS or decide not to tell the disease. The word “cancer” has never been pronounced. The water in the region is contaminated with radium and uranium. The quantity of radiation in the water is three times more than the norm established by the World Health Organization. People and animals are therefore exposed to radiation. Moreover, scrap metal from the uranium company are just thrown outside in the nature without being decontaminated. Local populations used the metal to build their houses.
As a way of “compensation”, the company opened a library in the city of Arlit and the population has access to free (contaminated) water. According to CRIIRAD researches, the company connives with the local leaders in order to destruct the local population and their environment for the sake of their own benefit. One can ask the question as to whether the global economy is compatible with the preservation of the environment. Local people (marginalized poor people without voice) and the environment are simply sacrificed at alter of powerful economies.
Thanks, Marie. I have only a general knowledge of the way global corporations take advantage of local populations, so it's good (though infuriating) to hear specifics. I wonder how the ecologically minded economists Killingsworth and Palmer write about (Daly and Brown) would respond to what's going on in Niger, and if their solutions could take hold, or if the business world's bottom-line mindset would ever allow an ecological economics . . . thinking out loud.
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