In Costa Rica, mining has been concentrated in the area known as the gold belt, where the canton of Abangares best exemplifies the effects of this reality. There the rivers run silver from the mercury, they look haggard, they are as acidic as a lemon and the ruins that have been converted into a museum never cease to attract tourists. In Miramar, the beautiful views of the Gulf of Nicoya have been destroyed by the fourth open-pit gold mine in Costa Rica, and desert landscapes have been created, interrupting the biological corridors of the region.

By Sonia Torres, Miramar Environmental Committee

Translated by Emma Wright

06/03/2011. In Esparza, the Macacona desert, a product of the first open-pit gold mine, bleeds daily into the local aquifer. It continues to leak concentrated heavy metals from the nearby pit and is a testimony to the loss of potable water wells in the area.

In Chomes, a beautiful hill disappeared, and on a public street the remnants of the mining era still remain, a legacy of the third open-pit gold mine … and a few steps away are the roofs that shelter the hopes of the men and women who believed in mining.

In Rio Chiquito, the sedimentation in the Arenal reservoir demonstrates how thousands of tons of earth fell away from the banks of the river before settling into the lake, which was used to produce electricity for the country.

And in San Carlos, as in the rest of the country where there have been struggles against mining, a community is turned into a battlefield when the mining companies resort to a third court, the community itself, in search of support for the commitments made by the industry’s unscrupulous leaders. Bitterness, strife and scorn replace the once shared love, solidarity and fellowship among brothers.

This is all without mentioning the social impacts in Abangares. Few formal studies have been made in order to correlate health issues with mining in a scientific way, despite the fact that we have twice the average rate of Down syndrome in the country and that some health officials already link it to mining. Few question why there are increases in abortions in communities in Abangares, such as Matapalo and Limonal, communities that are separated by an abandoned processing plant and tailing ponds. No one notices the high mercury levels in the blood of the locals.

As in any part of the world, mining companies abandon Costa Rica when it suits them or they change their name and continue to operate as if it had no affect on the rest of the country. Here they even take the savings of solidarity associations, like what happened to Ariel Resources in Abangares, where they also left unpaid bills for electric utilities and unpaid health insurance for the workers. Although here we do not have placards at the entrance to the mines that demonstrate the destructive practices of mining companies, what we do have are crosses in the cemeteries that represent the miners who have perished inside.

Here in Costa Rica we do not have the courage to take the bull by the horns and call a spade a spade for fear of being a misfit or achieving less than we had hoped. Maybe that’s why they made reforms to the Mining Code that resulted in self-deception because, among other things, they did not place restrictions on the mining activities of transnational companies that end up processing the gold that the miners extracted without any labor rights or medical benefits for the companies who are the ones who established the ‘Ore Law’ (ley de la broza) in the first place, a law that bought out the miners who were originally members of the cooperatives.

Here, as in any part of the World, the mineworker lacks the ability to rebel because there is no other source of work. The locals abandon their homes when the water dries up and it no longer makes it to their doors. There are no regulations and mining invades the city limits, gnawing away the roofs of the houses.

Here, as in Chile and other countries, the mining companies abandon the mines. They change their name, close their offices and barricade themselves in their mining edifices’ in constant threat from those outside.

In Abangares there are some widows who have had to resort to mining in order to support their family after their husbands have died. In order to increase public awareness we illustrate the struggle of these women as dependents on the mining system.

Here in Costa Rica, realistically there are few widows. It is the orphans who end up following in their father’s, uncles’ or grandfather’s footsteps, continuing to pick away at the earth’s insides, although they pay with their health and at times their life. Meanwhile, the most adventurous develop businesses with the gold, stained by the blood of our brothers, but they call this solidarity, progress and sustainable development.

The educational level of the Costa Rican miners is low; alcoholism is a disease and hope does not exist. There is no equipment that exists in order to breath fresh air while in the bowels of the earth, although they still believe in the broken promises and long for of the cooperatives that ring with cries of salvation.

In Costa Rica we gave into the Bellavista mine and in Miramar no one died of hunger due to lack of work. The collapse of the Bellavista mine demonstrated the failure of institutions to prevent and respond to mining emergencies in the 21^st century, as it was also not possible to properly handle neither the forewarned closure of the Macacona, nor the untimely closure of Beta Vargas and Rio Chiquito in the last quarter of the 20^th century.

How did the health authorities not recognize the risks of the mining industry when they demonstrated the results from the analysis of water a year before the collapse of the Bellavista mine? Because they were unable to monitor the “washings” of cyanide that were created by the broken geomembranes resulting from the movement of masses of rock due to mining?

How can the bitter experience of the Emergency Commission be ignored? A commission who declined to intervene in the Bellavista mine a few days before its collapse, despite the public outcry.

Mining continues to paint a grim picture after the Bellavista mine perished. The environmental impact study extended its support to the continued operation of the mine, it has not been shut-down and the company is working quietly with the government on a “new” mining proposal, which was already rejected by SETENA in 1996.

And this is without mentioning how the mining industry has produced fraudulent paperwork and permits in order to operate a mine in Crucitas. Corruption that has been evidenced in a thousand ways and finally recognized by the Administrative Tribunal thanks to the constant and diligent work of those who believe water is worth more than gold and that peace with nature is not nourished by false statements and writings.

Costa Rica has written its mining history in blood. Past, present and future. We have experience in mining and it has been disastrous. The threat remains, but the future is promising if we continue to follow the footsteps of the brave men and women who by foot, with a jacket and tie, burning lashes and shouting slogans, have said in many ways, no to mining.