EH Seminar: Reducing Mercury Exposure from Gold Mining: The Roles of Governments, NGOs and the Jewelry Industry

Summary: The leading cause of global mercury pollution is artisanal and small-scale gold mining, a subsistence livelihood in low-income countries that supplies roughly 20% of the world’s gold jewelry. Miners use mercury because it is the cheapest and easiest way to extract gold from the earth. Few know of the dangers mercury poses to their health, and even fewer know of any alternatives. The United Nations and national governments are working to address the problem, but they will need help from NGOs and the jewelry industry to succeed. This seminar describes avenues of mercury exposure due to artisanal and small-scale gold mining and the health impacts of these exposures. It then compares the approaches of various actors to mitigate this exposure, focusing especially on two NGOs using eco-labeling of jewelry to improve the situation: Fairtrade International and the Alliance for Responsible Mining. Dr. Sippl is a Post-Doctoral Fellow at Harvard Business School studying efforts to improve the human and environmental impacts of global supply chains. Specializing in the private governance activities of businesses and NGOs, Kristin explores why some industries receive more governance attention than others, and the determinants of successful advocacy for industrial reform. Her dissertation explained certification organization response to gold mining for the jewelry industry using qualitative case studies of the Alliance for Responsible Mining, Fairtrade International, and the Rainforest Alliance. Kristin has taught in the areas of international relations, human rights, and non-state actors. She received her Ph.D. in Political Science from Boston University in May 2016.