The sheer scale of the Yanacocha gold mine in Cajamarca, Peru, is staggering. It is the largest gold mine in Latin America, and the second largest in the world, covering 22,000 acres. The Minera Yanacocha company runs the mine, and is owned jointly by US and Peruvian mining companies and the World Bank. But there are major environmental problems as seen by this article.
U.S. owned Yanacocha Gold Mine in Northwest Peru is currently one of the largest gold producing mines in the world. There is one ounce of gold in every 30 tons of earth, which must first be extracted from mountains and leeched with Cyanide. The worst byproduct of further refining of the metals is Mercury- one of the most toxic substances and environmental pollutants. Mercury gets into the food chain and stays there, pregnant mothers in the United States are told to consume no more than one can of Solid White Tuna per week. They are told not to eat Shark, Swordfish, King Mackerel, or Tilefish as well. So when on June 2, 2000 a Newmont Mining Contractor Peru accidentally spilled 330 pounds of mercury along a 25-mile stretch of the Pan American Highway on the road to Lima- locals got angry. Further questions of environmental standards, internal whistle blowers and removal of sacred mountains put pressure on Newmont to clean up its act. Recently Newmont planned to mine a sacred mountain called Cerro Quilish, however thousands of protesters in this small community brought the streets to a halt and have forced the Colorado based company to withdraw those plans. Newmont believes contains more than a billion dollars' worth of gold. With gold's price at $500 an ounce, and 30 tons of ore required to make one ounce of gold, Newmont planned to remove 120,000,000,000 pounds of earth- or 60 million tons. But the question remains: If a Chinese owned Mining Company was getting rich by literally moving mountains in Colorado, would the American Government, and the American People allow them to remain? Those who work for the company may tolerate it, but the community, the country and the land suffer the consequences.