The following article was written by my younger brother, Mark Christopher Hackett, for Operation Broken Silence, the anti-genocide organization he founded in 2007.
In 2006, I, like many others, purchased an Apple laptop. At the same time I was purchasing what has been a very valuable product to me, a woman was getting raped in eastern Congo every few seconds. Like everyone else, I had no idea. At the time of my purchase, Apple also posted what was then the second highest quarter in terms of sales in Apple history.
The connection between my purchase and the rape of tens of thousands of women over the last decade in eastern Congo would be a horrifying thought to anyone. How did my purchase of a laptop drive an ongoing war in one of the most devastated regions of the world? (The above video explains how.)
A Booming Industry with a Dark Secret
There difficult to trace and there are hundreds of millions of dollars of them out there in cell phones, laptops, and iPods. Conflict minerals are an extremely profitable trade that has fueled the violence in Congo for years now, and the current death toll according to the International Rescue Committee is over 5.4 million. That’s the world’s deadliest war since World War II.
The dark secret of the computer electronics industry has come to light in the past few years thanks to Congo activists here in the United States and around the world, but the deadly problem remains despite strides forward by some of the leading industry giants. Under the flagship of the Electronics Industry Citizenship Coalition (EICC), several industry leaders are “working on the finishing touches to a certification scheme that should help firms identify from which mines minerals and metals such as coltan, tin and tantalum” according to an announcement in May 2010.
Over the past several months, a small but growing group of activists under the flagship advocacy organization on the conflict mineral issue the Enough Project have been targeting and boycotting major electronic firms such as HP, Dell, and Intel (Intel got hit so hard by the activists on their Facebook fan page the company actually blocked comments briefly) . In the past several weeks though, the goal has been changed to what can be considered the “golden apple” of all the electronics firms: Apple.
To explain why, from the Enough Project’s website:
As one of the world’s leading electronics companies, Apple has the trend-setting power to influence the entire industry. If every electronics company ensured that the minerals used in its products were conflict-free, rebel and militia groups would be denied the estimated $180 million they make each year and use to terrorize the communities of eastern Congo.
Currently, tracing conflict minerals is extremely difficult, though not impossible. 6 0 Minutes recently tracked minerals on how they get out of Congo and into the wider markets of the world, eventually finding their way into cell phones, laptops, and other electronic devices:
So Why Target Apple If Everyone Else is Responsible?
The more appropriate question is why not? Apple has thus far been silent on solving the issue despite it’s competitors taking minimal responsibility and preparing to solve the problem of tracing minerals to their sources. Apple has only briefly expressed support for other groups doing the legwork for them, but to date has not done an extensive review on where it’s resources that go into the popular iPhone, iPod, and computer line come from. However, other computer company giants have, namely HP.
Apple attempted to defend itself in a report published earlier this year:
Apple maintains that “the combination of a lengthy supply chain and a refining process makes it difficult to track and trace tantalum from the mine to finished products—a challenge that Apple and others are tackling in a variety of ways.”
Unfortunately, the report does not tell how Apple audits it’s suppliers, who in turn can have over a dozen suppliers, of which all of those suppliers have even more. There was no mention of those suppliers holding one another accountable.
Of course, it is not Apple’s fault that there is a growing possibility conflict minerals are being sold in their retail stores through the medium of their products. It is extremely difficult to trace a small amount of tungsten or tantalum all the way back to the mine it came from, especially considering that there can be many suppliers along the way. John Prendergast of the Enough Project has more than once called this “a direct but innocent role in the violence.” Simply put, most of us, including many people working for computer giants like Apple, HP, and Dell had no idea until a few years ago.
The good news is that all of this can change. Apple is without a doubt one of the leading electronic firms in the world, and with great power comes great responsibility. Is Apple the only company that needs to take action? No. Does Apple need to be one of the first that does? Absolutely. Apple wields an enormous amount of influence over it’s immediate suppliers, but even more importantly the company has a greater influence over the general public. If Apple publicly declared it was gearing up to the lead the fight against conflict minerals, elements of the public would begin looking at other tech companies as well and expect the same. Apple gets enough good press as it is already, imagine another aspect of greatness on the company’s image.
This is a rare opportunity for several competitors in the industry to come together and make an extremely positive impact on a nation that has suffered more than enough, and while we’d like to think it is up to maker’s of our favorite electronic products to get conflict minerals out of our products, it simply is not. It is our responsibility as consumers to create a new demand for conflict-free products. That’s all activists want from Apple, Dell, HP, and the dozens of other companies out there that play a role in this area.