More than a third of Africa’s great ape population is in danger due to mining, according to a study published by Science Advances. A team of researchers from the German Center for Integrative Biodiversity Research, the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (MLU) and the non-profit conservation organisation Re:wild showed that the threat of mining has been underestimated.
The increasing demand for copper, lithium, nickel, cobalt, and other chemical elements needed to transition to cleaner energy is causing a surge in mining in certain areas in Africa. This is increasing deforestation in tropical forests, home to great apes.
Worryingly, this study demonstrates that the impact of mining has been greatly underestimated, and more than 1/3 of the entire population — nearly 180,000 great apes — is at risk. The researchers go even further and speculate that, as mining companies are not required to make their biodiversity data available, the true impact is likely to be greater.
The team used data from mining sites in 17 countries and defined 10km around them as direct impact (including habitat destruction as well as light and noise pollution) and 50km for indirect impact caused by new infrastructure and increased human activity. Based on this, the authors calculated how many African apes could potentially be negatively impacted by mining and mapped areas where frequent mining and high ape densities overlapped.
The most affected areas include Liberia, Sierra Leone, Mali, and Guinea, where the areas of high ape density and mining were the largest. Overall, the most significant impact was found in Guinea, where up to 83% of Guinea’s ape population could be directly or indirectly impacted by mining activities.
“Currently, studies on other species suggest that mining harms apes through pollution, habitat loss, increased hunting pressure, and disease, but this is an incomplete picture,” said Dr Jessica Junker, researcher at Re:wild. “The lack of data sharing by mining projects hampers our scientific understanding of its true impact on great apes and their habitat.”
”Mining companies need to focus on avoiding their impacts on great apes as much as possible and use offsetting as a last resort as there is currently no example of a great ape offset that has been successful”, added Dr Genevieve Campbell, senior researcher at Re:wild. ‘’Avoidance needs to take place already during the exploration phase, but unfortunately, this phase is poorly regulated, and ‘baseline data’ are collected by companies after many years of exploration and habitat destruction have taken place. These data then do not accurately reflect the original state of the great ape populations in the area before mining impacts.’’
“A shift away from fossil fuels is good for the climate but must be done in a way that does not jeopardise biodiversity. In its current iteration, it may even be going against the very environmental goals we’re aiming for”, concluded Dr Junker. “Companies, lenders and nations need to recognise that it may sometimes be of greater value to leave some regions untouched to mitigate climate change and help prevent future epidemics.”
Junker J et al. Threat of mining to African great apes.Sci. Adv. 10, eadl0335 (2024). DOI:10.1126/sciadv.adl0335