|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
Today Earthworks, in partnership with Instituto Cordilheira and Movimento pelas Serras e Águas de Minas Gerais (MovSAM), published a report that shows the extent to which Vale S.A. is responsible for serious and ongoing human rights violations at its mining operations in Minas Gerais, Brazil.
Vale spends a lot of time and money branding itself as a socially and environmentally responsible company. It claims that it complies with international best practices and sustainability standards. In showing what happens every day at Vale’s operations in Minas Gerais, this report proves that this is not true. Minas Gerais has seen two major tragedies at Vale mines. The 2015 Fundão dam collapse killed 19 people and affected thousands along the Doce River. The 2019 Brumadinho dam failure caused 272 deaths and devastation to the Paraopeba River.
In the wake of these disasters, Vale made a series of commitments to improve safety for its workers and the communities living downstream of its operations. But their behavior in the years since does not match up with its rhetoric. The Truth about Vale S.A. in Minas Gerais: Commitments and Abuses lays out inconsistencies between Vale’s public discourse and its business practices in a complete timeline for the first time.
The findings are troubling, to say the least. Even after knowing its dams might collapse, Vale failed to take measures that could have avoided the tragedies in 2015 and 2019. While communities and families whose lives were destroyed continue to struggle to access reparations and rebuild their lives, Vale has been accused of misusing funds designated for families.
In the years since, the company has continued forcing people off their land and away from their communities, including evacuations in the middle of the night with no prior warning, and without allowing people to return to their homes, even years later.
Work-related illnesses and unsafe conditions have been common at Vale’s Minas Gerais operations for a long time. Earlier studies have confirmed complaints of ongoing health problems from local communities due to dust and water pollution from Vale mines, as well as psychological and emotional impacts.
To put it bluntly: conditions have not improved.
Currently, 20 of Vale’s tailings dams are at maximum risk of failure. Impacted communities are demanding Vale address these risks, fulfill its reparations commitments, and stop plans to expand in sensitive areas. According to the company’s own studies, Vale is currently investing in new projects that could lead to the violation of the rights of Indigenous Peoples and increase child prostitution in cities adjacent to its facilities. These controversial expansions would also contribute to deforestation in the imperiled Atlantic Forest, threatening environmentally protected areas, jeopardising biodiversity and water resources, and exacerbating climate collapse. Millions of people depend on drinking water from the aquifers below the site of Vale’s proposed Serra da Gandarela mine.
Minas Gerais communities have been sounding the alarm on Vale for years. Vale investors and shareholders must hold the company accountable. Specifically, Earthworks is calling for the creation of an Independent International Commission to review Vale’s environmental and social impacts, and a permanent complaint channel for Vale’s operations—along with an abrupt halt to licensing for the dangerous Apolo and Serra da Serpentina Projects.
Vale’s operations continue to have serious risks and violate human rights. Investors have a responsibility to monitor Vale’s actions and demand that the affected communities be respected and listened to. They should demand the company deliver on its promises to act ethically and strictly follow international best practices.
