Toxic Truth Behind Myanmar's Rare Earths Boom Exposed

[geovalin]

Global Witness Partners

 

Myanmar’s rare-earths industry, fuelling the world’s green energy transition, is being powered by toxic extraction methods, environmental devastation and rampant exploitation, according to a sobering new investigation.

 

In the northern Kachin state, Chinese-backed mining operations are using a hazardous method known as in-situ leaching, injecting chemicals like ammonium nitrate into mountain soils to flush out rare-earth minerals. What’s left behind, say local activists, is poisoned land, polluted rivers, and communities suffering in silence.

 

“We can’t stay near the sites for more than 30 minutes — it’s hard to breathe,” said Lahtaw Kai, a Myanmar environmental campaigner whose name has been changed for her safety. “Workers are unprotected, often fall ill, and are simply replaced.”

 

The sludge collected from the process contains not only rare earths, but a cocktail of harmful chemicals. Human rights observers describe scenes of toxic ponds leaking into water sources and hills stripped bare, with little to no regard for the people living nearby.

 

Despite a 2018 export ban under Myanmar’s former civilian government, extraction surged after the 2021 military coup. The lucrative trade, worth $1.4 billion in 2023, now funds conflict, particularly in regions controlled by the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO), a powerful ethnic militia that has recently regained control of key mining zones.

 

While the KIO is seen by locals as more legitimate than junta-aligned forces, the mining remains largely unregulated. “The environmental destruction is the same on both sides,” says a Global Witness report, urging immediate international attention.

 

These minerals — including dysprosium, critical for electric vehicle batteries and wind turbines — end up in supply chains serving global firms like Volkswagen, Toyota, Siemens Gamesa and Hyundai, via Chinese magnet producers.

 

As demand for rare earths surges, activists like Lahtaw Kai and Seng Li are calling for urgent reform. “The world must not turn a blind eye,” said Seng. “If you’re benefiting from this industry, you have a responsibility to ensure it doesn’t destroy the communities at its source.”

 

Without stricter oversight and international pressure, Myanmar’s rare-earth boom may come at a price too steep to ignore — both for its people and the planet.

 

-2025-05-26

[mfd101]

And noone outside Myanmar gives a damn.

[Banana7]

Those rare earths are also used by hundreds of electric vehicle manufacturers like BYD, mostly Chinese manufacturers. The old Chinese slogan applies "get the money and get out".