Groundbreaking Treaty on Toxic Mercury

Governments around the world should immediately sign the new, groundbreaking Minamata Convention on Mercury, Human Rights Watch said today. Officials around the world will meet in Kumamoto, Japan beginning October 7, 2013, to formally adopt the treaty. Once adopted, it will be opened for signature and ratification.

Mercury is a poisonous metal that can cause ill-health, disability, and death. The convention obliges governments to reduce mercury use and emissions in a range of industries and processes.

“Millions of people around the world are exposed to the toxic effects of mercury,” said Juliane Kippenberg, senior children’s rights researcher at Human Rights Watch. “This treaty will help protect both the environment and people’s right to health.”

The treaty is named after the Japanese town of Minamata, where one of the worst mercury poisoning disasters ever occurred in the 1950s. A chemical factory polluted the bay with mercury. According to official figures, 1,700 people died, but the real number is believed to be much higher. In addition, tens of thousands more suffered life-long disability, including brain damage, intellectual disabilities, birth defects, and other health problems. Many of the victims were children.

Most mercury is currently used in small-scale gold mining. An estimated 10 to 15 million people work in small-scale gold mining in Africa, Asia, and Latin America and rely on mercury as a cheap and easy method for extracting gold. As liquid mercury is poured into ground-up ore, it attracts the gold particles and forms an amalgam. To separate the gold from the mercury, miners then burn the amalgam, turning the mercury into poisonous gas. Much of the gold from small-scale mining is exported and reaches the global gold market.




(2013-10-07/HRW)