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mariacallous · 9 months ago

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Last February, as the sound of automatic weapons erupted in the early hours before dawn, Amina Museni hurriedly packed a bag while her husband, Joseph, shook their three children awake. They were joining a group of neighbors fleeing their hamlet as the front line between the Congolese army and rebels of the March 23 Movement, or M23, crept closer. For days afterward, they walked across the hilly landscape of Masisi, in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, before reaching one of the camps that have sprung up around Goma, the capital of North Kivu province. There, they pitched their tent, a young family of five among more than a million people displaced by the resurgence of a conflict that has ravaged Congo for nearly three decades.

When Foreign Policy visited the camp last July, Museni sat amid an undulating sea of white tarpaulins stretched over eucalyptus sticks. “When I was little, I lived in a tent with my parents,” Museni said, her youngest child, Nestor, cradled into her neck. “Now my children have to endure the same. It feels like a curse.”

Why Congo has been in a perennial state of upheaval since the mid-1990s has been the subject of much debate, but no other narrative has cut through as much as that of so-called conflict minerals. In the 2000s, the link between markets’ demand for minerals and the war in Congo helped bring attention to the conflict in an unprecedented way. Western organizations such as the Enough Project and Global Witness mobilized around the seductive proposition that the solution to one of the world’s deadliest conflicts was within the grasp of consumers and policymakers, triggering a series of laws and regulations beginning with, in the United States in 2010, Section 1502 of the Dodd-Frank Act. The logic behind the legislation was simple. “Armed groups finance themselves through the exploitation of cassiterite, gold, coltan,” Fidel Bafilemba, a Congolese researcher who used to work for the Enough Project, told me at the time. “By stopping the export of these conflict minerals, we dry up their resources and lessen the violence.”

Section 1502 required companies to conduct due diligence checks on their supply chain to disclose their use of minerals originating from Congo and neighboring countries and to determine whether those minerals may have benefited armed groups. The legislation didn’t outright ban the sourcing of minerals from mines contributing to conflict financing but instead intended “this transparency and its attendant reputational risk” to pressure companies to stop buying them voluntarily, according to Toby Whitney, one of the authors of Section 1502.

What followed is an important lesson for a world rushing to secure critical minerals for the energy transition. Western advocacy led to policies focused on derisking supply chains and virtue signaling to consumers, rather than improving artisanal miners’ living conditions or addressing the conflict’s root causes. That narrative continues today: An Apple store in Berlin was vandalized last week by Fridays for Future activists accusing the tech giant of sourcing so-called conflict minerals from Congo.

ITSCI, the region’s leading private traceability scheme, is facing criticism about the validity of its work—and that it has not improved the lives of artisanal miners in the region. ITSCI stresses its limited mandate and that it is working as intended. But in a cruel twist, the cost of the due diligence program has been shouldered by Congolese miners themselves, effectively asking the world’s poorest workers to pay for the right to sell their own resources to Western companies.

This week, industry leaders and activists gathering at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in Paris for the annual Forum on Responsible Mineral Supply Chains will need to reassess their approach. “We welcomed Dodd-Frank,” said Alexis Muhima, a Congolese researcher, during a meeting in a cramped office in Goma. “But what it did is outsource complex issues to the private sector, and we’ve been paying for it ever since.”

“The Americans didn’t think this through.”

There was a time in the 1970s when the quarries of Nyabibwe, a mining town in South Kivu province, were run with enough capital to employ 500 workers and to invest in semi-industrial machinery. Every month, the French company in charge shipped 20 metric tons of cassiterite ore—a component of tin—back to Europe for cans, wires, and solder. Safari Kulimuchi was a worker at the mines, starting at age 17, who quickly rose through the ranks to become a manager. “It was an exciting time. … Things seemed to be working out,” Kulimuchi recalled to Foreign Policy over dinner in Nyabibwe. But, he said, “it didn’t last.”

In the years that followed, Kulimuchi witnessed the economic unraveling of Congo (then Zaire), rotten under decades of rule by dictator Mobutu Sese Seko, who presided over the country from 1965 to 1997. Amid a global economic downturn in the mid-1980s, the French company departed, abandoning its workers to fend for themselves. “Overnight, we had no wages, no tools, no structure,” Kulimuchi said. “We used to have a stone crusher. Now we had to crush rocks with a hammer.”

Nyabibwe was far from an exception. Across the country, as investment dried up and the state abdicated its responsibilities, people resorted to making ends meet any way they could. An informal economy based on débrouillardise, or resourcefulness, sprouted in the ruins of Mobutu’s derelict regime. That informal economy is estimated to account for more than 80 percent of Congolese economic activity today. Nyabibwe grew into a town as people came from far and wide to work in the mines. They replaced the industrial machinery with picks and shovels, a low-capital, labor-intensive extraction called artisanal mining, as opposed to industrial mining. “Artisanal mining is the heart of our economy. It’s the reason Nyabibwe became this big center,” Kulimuchi said. The World Bank estimated in 2008 that up to 16 percent of the Congolese population depended on the sector. “For us, it’s a lifeline,” Kulimuchi added.

Mobutu was finally ousted in 1997 by a coalition helmed by the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), a rebel army led by Paul Kagame. Kagame had just seized power in Rwanda in the aftermath of the genocide there and was intent on chasing after Hutus responsible for the massacres, many of whom had crossed into Zaire. What became the First Congo War brought Laurent-Désiré Kabila, a Congolese rebel, to power.

Kabila’s allies in the RPF quickly turned into foes when they refused to relinquish control over an area where instability threatened their security and interests. The Second Congo War began in 1998 with the creation of the RCD, a Tutsi-led, Rwandan-backed armed group that quickly gained control of a large swath of eastern Congo. The rebels began shipping cargo loads of coltan and cassiterite ores out of mines such as Nyabibwe’s into Rwanda just as the price of coltan, a key component of capacitors used in mobile phones and most electronic devices, soared with the demand for electronic goods at the turn of the century. A 2001 United Nations report estimated that Rwanda made at least $250 million during a temporary spike in prices in late 1999 and 2000. A popular formulation in Western campaigns at the time linked the violence in Congo to “blood phones.”

Many experts have criticized the advocacy of the 2000s for sometimes going so far as to suggest that conflict minerals were the root cause of the violence, painting armed actors as merely bloodthirsty, greedy militias—instead of considering real, historical grievances. The Enough Project campaigns, leaning hard on celebrities such as Robin Wright and Ryan Gosling to spread the group’s message, obfuscated the nuances of the conflict and the vital place of artisanal mining in the local economy. “The ‘conflict minerals’ label was problematic,” said Sophia Pickles, a former Global Witness campaigner and U.N. investigator. “This isn’t just about Congo—it’s a global issue.”

The campaigns succeeded in putting the issue on U.S. legislators’ agenda, but Section 1502 of the Dodd-Frank Act was both too specific—singling out the so-called 3T minerals (tin for cassiterite, tantalum for coltan, and tungsten) in eastern Congo—and extremely vague on execution. It deferred the drafting of rules to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), leaving companies with no clear guidelines to report on their supply chain.

The law created a panicked scramble in the industry, said William Millman, a former technical director at Kyocera AVX, a leading manufacturer of electronic components and major coltan buyer. “Everybody was ignorant about the specifics. We just relied on our smelters.” Unlike an oil company directly operating its wells or a sneaker company outsourcing production to a sweatshop in Asia, electronics companies have virtually no way of knowing where the minerals in their products come from upstream of the smelters or refiners that have turned them into smooth metal—unless the smelters themselves know. “I visited all my suppliers to gather information. They knew very little because it was all largely bought on the spot market with international brokers,” Millman said. As a result of Section 1502, companies liable to fall under the SEC rule demanded that their suppliers simply stop buying from eastern Congo.

The result? A de facto embargo dropped like a bomb on the mining communities of North and South Kivu, just as the region was emerging from its latest cycle of violence. Nyabibwe had navigated two major wars mostly unscathed, but when I visited in June 2012, the town was in the midst of an existential crisis. Businesses dependent on the cash flow generated by the mines were closing down one by one, unable to sell stockpiles of rubber boots and shovels, blacksmithing services, or simply food. Tellingly, the local nightclub had shut its doors. More concerning were thousands of families’ insufficient funds to access health care, forcing women to give birth at home. One study found that the boycott increased the probability of infant mortality in affected mining communities by at least 143 percent.

Kulimuchi, who was then 54, was still managing a small team of undeterred miners. “The Americans didn’t think this through,” he said. His team had three metric tons of ore stored in a warehouse in Bukavu, South Kivu’s capital, waiting to be bought and shipped. “School is about to start again. Where are we going to find the money to send our children?”

Though U.S. lawmakers had struck out on their own with Section 1502, industrywide talks to create guidelines for the responsible sourcing of minerals in high-risk areas globally were already underway at the OECD. The OECD guidelines, adopted later in 2010, ended up becoming the foundation for the SEC rules, released in 2012. “The choke point in the supply chain is the smelters—everything has to go through them, and there aren’t many smelters in the world,” Millman said. “The OECD came up with a standardized protocol to audit and certify the smelters on an annual basis to know that they have control and knowledge of their supply chain.”

According to Millman, a handful of downstream companies seemed genuinely interested in doing things right and getting involved at the mine level. In 2011, together with Motorola and the Washington-based NGO Resolve, what was then AVX launched Solutions for Hope, a pilot project in Congo’s Katanga (now Tanganyika) province, where there was no conflict. They created a closed-pipe supply chain, sourcing from artisanal mines through a company that sold directly to a Chinese smelter and then onward to AVX, which manufactured components for Motorola and Hewlett-Packard.

Solutions for Hope also decided to hire the services of ITSCI. Its “bag and tag” traceability scheme set up by the International Tin Association (ITA) promised to trace minerals from the mine and guarantee their origin to buyers through a paper trail associated with sealed tags affixed on bags. According to Millman, Solutions for Hope was successful largely because its integrated supply chain bypassed traders and brought end-user companies closer to the miners. Replicating it would take time and effort. But, Millman said, “what other companies who had sat back saw was that, suddenly, with ITSCI there was a way for their CEOs and CFOs to sign off on their SEC statements. … And so everyone piled in, and it became the easy option.” ITSCI’s first project in eastern Congo was implemented in October 2012 in Nyabibwe.

“Do you think these people stopped working?”

Ten years on from when we first met, Kulimuchi came down from the mountainside where he had been working with his son on a sunny day last July, his broad smile still intact. The mining site hadn’t changed much either. Around us, men wearing flip-flops were using the same basic tools to split the earth open, with no protective equipment.

Initially, Kulimuchi recalled, the artisanal miners had been relieved when a large delegation showed up to officially launch the traceability scheme. “It meant we could finally start selling again. All my financial worries would be a thing of the past,” Kulimuchi said he thought at the time.

Instead, an elaborate public-private bureaucracy emerged, driven in part by regional governments intent on bringing the artisanal mining sector under control but quickly superimposed by foreign private sector initiatives like ITSCI, responding to market demand for paperwork required by end-user companies to file their reports to the SEC.

“We started selling again, but it’s a cacophony. There is a ton of admin, taxes after taxes, and prices have gone down. We have been weakened by all this,” Kulimuchi said.

As the de facto embargo on eastern Congo’s minerals lifted, by 2012 thousands of small sites across the region found themselves effectively outlawed by a new mine site validation process. To be able to sell, Congolese mining sites must now be inspected by a delegation of government representatives, NGOs, and U.N. agencies. At sites given the go-ahead from that audit, the Congolese artisanal mining agency carries out its own checks while also tagging and recording the minerals in logbooks for ITSCI. There are other records kept by the provincial government’s Mining Division and a regional body. Many sites are still waiting for an audit. For those that don’t conform, the consequences are devastating: “You are destroying the livelihood of hundreds or thousands of people,” said Maxie Muwonge, who was a program manager for the International Organization for Migration between 2013 and 2018 when it was tasked with coordinating the validation process. “This excludes entire communities. What are they meant to do? Do you think these people stopped working?”

In fact, even under the de facto embargo, the minerals trade never really stopped. It just went further underground. Rwanda’s export statistics, which experts say don’t match its reserves, suggest that smuggling to neighboring countries spiked during the period. While the volume of trafficked minerals has fallen with the reopening of the legal market in eastern Congo, smuggling is still an issue, not least because of the market distortion caused by heavy regulation and taxation in Congo of small businesses. “Many collapsed because they couldn’t meet the requirements, and the investment in the sector decreased. It broke down artisanal miners even further,” Muwonge said.

Joyeux Mumpenzi followed in his mother’s footsteps when he decided to become a négociant, an intermediary who buys minerals from the creuseurs, or diggers, and transports them to export companies in large cities—a reflection of the highly organized division of labor in the artisanal sector. “To begin with, we have no say regarding the going price—the London Metal Exchange sets it, and it fluctuates constantly,” he said. “Then there are all the taxes, and finally, the export company retains a penalty on my payment for ITSCI.”

Today, 99 percent of ITSCI’s revenue comes from the levies it collects from upstream actors based on the volumes of minerals tagged and exported, ITSCI program manager Mickaël Daudin said in an interview. The organization says artisanal miners are not supposed to pay for the scheme. But the cost, or at least a percentage of it, is passed down the supply chain to the négociants and ultimately to the miners. “I have no choice” in doing so, Mumpenzi said. “I end up earning little more than they do, and I take huge financial risks.” The 33-year-old trader says he earns about $300 a month, while an artisanal miner’s household makes $200 on average.

ITSCI, which operates in both Congo and Rwanda, applies differentiated levies to businesses in the two countries. Daudin said that’s because “the cost of implementation … remains much higher” in Congo than in Rwanda but declined to disclose the levies’ rates; a Congolese government official called it a “conflict tax.” The rate discrepancy effectively encourages trafficking to Rwanda for Congolese mining operators keen to increase their margins.

A report published in 2022 by Global Witness cited “[s]ome industry sources” alleging that ITSCI was in fact set up to facilitate the laundering of Congolese minerals smuggled into Rwanda. Foreign Policy hasn’t been able to confirm the claim, but the tagging system that ITSCI created does offer the perfect cover for smuggling, in Rwanda or Congo. The integrity of the scheme relies entirely on the integrity of the people implementing it; the tags themselves offer no guarantee. In a statement released in response to the report, ITSCI wrote that it “strongly rejects all Global Witness’ stated or implied allegations of wrongdoing, facilitating deliberate misuse of ITSCI systems or illegal activity.” If ITSCI had aimed to maximize smuggling into Rwanda as alleged, a spokesperson wrote to Foreign Policy in an email, “ITSCI would not have launched in Katanga in 2011 nor in any other adjoining locations at other times. During 15 years of implementation, ITSCI has continued to expand the programme in [Congo], now supporting more than 1,500 sites across 8 Provinces.”

The Global Witness report also documented how the system can be breached without ITSCI’s cooperation. For starters, the tagging is not performed by ITSCI but by Congolese government agents who earn less than the miners themselves and sometimes go for months without pay at all. From bribing agents to trading in tags, the number of ways to circumvent the system is almost limitless—as Mumpenzi demonstrated to Foreign Policy. The négociant stood up from the sofa in his living room and walked to a corner where sturdy white plastic bags had been stacked. “See the tags? The bags were sealed by an agent before I picked them up yesterday,” he said. “The mineral sand now has to be washed, so when I’ll bring the bags to the washing station, the tags will be removed. When minerals are washed, the weight goes down, so this is a perfect time to smuggle in minerals before a new tag goes on. As long as the bag weighs less than it did initially, no one will say anything.”

ITSCI doesn’t rebuke such allegations categorically. The organization says it was aware of many of the incidents documented by Global Witness and had already addressed them. “The program isn’t perfect. There are issues, and there always will be,” Daudin told Foreign Policy. “But from my point of view, it wasn’t better before.”

Kulimuchi and other artisanal miners might beg to differ. Rather than improving their living conditions, the “increasing regulation of the artisanal mining sector and responsible sourcing efforts, have rather had a negative overall effect on the socio-economic position of artisanal miners,” analysts at the International Peace Information Service (IPIS), a leading minerals research institute, wrote in 2019. Guillaume de Brier, a researcher at IPIS, told me that “working in an ITSCI or a non-ITSCI site doesn’t change anything. Conditions are dismal in both cases. There’s no difference in terms of child labor, and miners don’t earn more.”

When asked by Foreign Policy about this criticism, an ITSCI spokesperson stressed the organization’s limited mandate as a traceability and due diligence not-for-profit initiative. “It does not function as a certification mechanism,” the spokesperson wrote, and the organization’s focus “does not extend to working conditions.”

However, evidence suggests that responsible sourcing efforts have failed to shift conflict dynamics. A 2022 report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), part of its mandate to evaluate the impact of Section 1502, was titled “Conflict Minerals: Overall Peace and Security in Eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo Has Not Improved Since 2014.” Violence has instead risen, remaining “relatively constant from 2014 through 2016 but steadily [increasing] from 2017 through 2021,” GAO wrote.

Arguably, some measure of progress has been achieved at the 3T mining sites targeted by Dodd-Frank, where the presence of armed groups has decreased. But while ITSCI claims to have played a role, de Brier says the scheme merely implanted in sites where the situation was already better. Overall, this demilitarization has largely been the result of Congolese policies and the evolution of conflict dynamics themselves: The defeat of the M23 rebellion in 2013 (the armed group changed names multiple times as it successively integrated into and rebelled against the national army) led to the dismantling of one of the country’s most predatory mafia networks. Today, for instance, Bisie, once an iconic mining site under the control of Bosco “The Terminator” Ntaganda, is operated by the Canadian company Alphamin. (Ntaganda is serving a 30-year prison sentence in Belgium following his conviction by the International Criminal Court for war crimes and crimes against humanity.)

Now though, with the resurgence of the M23 rebellion since November 2021—which has displaced Museni, her family, and more than 2.5 million others—even that small measure of progress is under threat.

“This is how the armed groups are paid.”

Belgian colonial administration profoundly altered the Congolese relationship with the land, introducing private ownership and displacing people for commercial exploitation. Since independence, who has the right to own land—and by extension its resources—has remained an unresolved existential question. “The main resource driving conflict isn’t coltan,” said Onesphore Sematumba, an analyst at the International Crisis Group. “It is the land. It’s material ownership, of course, but also who has a legitimate right to be here.”

In the borderlands of eastern Congo, these questions have been exacerbated by intertwined histories with neighboring countries. Hutus and Tutsis, who arrived from Rwanda in successive waves throughout the 20th century—first brought by Belgian colonialists to work on plantations in the territories of Rutshuru and Masisi—have struggled to find acceptance and secure land rights. Rwanda, meanwhile, a small, densely populated country with little resources of its own, largely depends on economic ties and access to Congo’s resources. These two dynamics have helped create the vicious circle of the last three decades. Backed by Rwanda, the RCD rebellion and its successors claiming to fight for Tutsis’ rights have helped entrench tensions along ethnic lines while facilitating land grab by a small elite.

“Indigenous communities in Masisi were dispossessed of their land during the war,” said Janvier Murairi, a Congolese researcher. “Today’s farm and mine owners are people who had links to the RCD. Everything from Mushaki to Masisi town belongs to hardly more than 10 people.”

One such owner was Edouard Mwangachuchu, an aspiring Tutsi politician and a member of the RCD’s political branch, who was awarded a concession covering seven mines in Rubaya by the rebel administration in 2001. Two years later, the Sun City Agreement, a peace deal negotiated between rebel factions with little regard for social justice or community grievances, endorsed Mwangachuchu’s ownership over the mining sites as a prize of war for the RCD, granting his company, MHI (now SMB), control over what have become the most productive sites at Congo’s largest coltan mine. Today, Rubaya accounts for about 15 percent of global coltan production.

Rubaya is emblematic of the way ITSCI, and more broadly due diligence as it is practiced today, treats “conflictual issues, such as concessions and land ownership, … as a black box,” Christoph N. Vogel writes in his 2022 book, Conflict Minerals Inc., turning a blind eye to political issues around social justice and equity, even as those are drivers of the violence it means to help prevent.

In Rubaya, Mwangachuchu’s plan to turn the quarries into an industrial mine spurred a backlash from local communities. “The artisanal miners didn’t accept that this family [the Mwangachuchus] who had come into the possession of the mines through the conflict could take away their livelihood,” Murairi said. The government mediated a deal: The miners were allowed to continue mining SMB sites but had to sell exclusively to the company.

ITSCI began operating in Rubaya in 2014, tagging minerals from both SMB and peripheral sites belonging to a state-owned mining company, SAKIMA. But the situation unraveled as the scheme was embroiled in a tit-for-tat commercial war in the years that followed.

Suspecting that ITSCI’s tags were being used to launder the sale of its minerals to a rival trading company, SMB eventually turned to ITSCI’s main competitor in the tag-and-bag business, Better Mining. The move should have represented a major financial blow to ITSCI, the loss of roughly half its revenues for Congo. Instead, as production at the SAKIMA sites kept growing while SMB’s dwindled, ITSCI’s business was preserved. According to an internal U.N. report provided to Foreign Policy, “Only about seventeen percent of the production that officially originates from the SAKIMA concession has in fact been mined there.” The report noted that “[s]uch discrepancy between official data and reality is only conceivable if a structured mechanism of fraud is established.”

Daudin, the ITSCI program manager, responded that ITSCI is “confident about its data.” He argued that the production increase was due to the higher level of investment going to SAKIMA sites when local miners turned away from SMB.

The M23’s resurgence dealt the last blow to Mwangachuchu, who was arrested in March 2023 and charged with treason after weapons were allegedly found on the grounds of his company’s facilities in Rubaya. According to the prosecutor, Mwangachuchu intended to support the M23 rebellion. The government has since revoked SMB’s mining permits. Few people in North Kivu will feel sorry for Mwangachuchu, “but one of the protagonists was pushed out in favor of the other, and that never works,” said Achile Kitsa, a former private secretary to the provincial mines minister.

The Congolese army took full control of Rubaya last spring, leaving the former SMB concession at the mercy of local armed groups it used as proxies on the front line against the M23. “This is how the armed groups are paid,” said a Congolese researcher who spoke on condition of anonymity. ITSCI resumed its operations in June, tagging minerals from the SAKIMA perimeter up until November, when the road was cut off by the fighting, according to Daudin. “We relaunched our activities after evaluating each site with the government services,” he said in July. “There are no nonstate armed groups in our sites.”

In a December report, the U.N. Group of Experts on Congo contradicted Daudin, establishing that between June and November, the “production from [the former SMB] sites was either smuggled to Rwanda or laundered into the official supply chain using [ITSCI] tags for minerals produced in [the SAKIMA concession], where mining activities were still authorized.”

“ITSCI recognizes that there have been, and remain, ongoing risks regarding fraud and presence of both non-state and state armed groups in the area of Masisi territory, North Kivu,” the ITSCI spokesperson wrote. “These risks are regularly reported through ITSCI’s OECD-aligned systems.”

Muhima, the Congolese researcher, sees the possibility of tainted minerals in the ITSCI supply chain as inevitable, given its built-in conflict of interest. “Their income depends on the volume they export. They cannot stop tagging minerals, or their business will collapse.”

“We don’t need another scheme.”

Congolese activists were not pleased with the Global Witness report exposing the shortcomings of ITSCI when it was published in 2022. They felt that the research mostly rehashed criticisms and evidence that they had presented for many years without being listened to and that the report failed to draw the necessary conclusions, ending with tepid recommendations to reform ITSCI or consider options to replace it with another independent scheme. “We don’t need another scheme,” Murairi said. “We don’t need more foreigners who think Congolese can’t do anything.”

Global Witness’s cautiousness should perhaps not come as a surprise. The activist organization played no small part in paving the way for today’s conundrum, and the risk of triggering another de facto embargo on Congolese minerals hangs heavy. “We’ve learnt some very difficult lessons, and as an activist, I’m not the one who bore the consequences of bad policymaking,” said Pickles, the former Global Witness campaigner.

When I pressed Daudin last July about ITSCI’s resumption of its activities in Rubaya, even as armed groups were swarming the mining area, he dodged: “If we don’t start tagging again, mining communities will be the first ones to suffer from not being able to carry on their activities.”

ITSCI suffered a major setback in October 2022, when the Responsible Minerals Initiative (RMI), a member association of more than 400 of the world’s largest corporations, announced that it was taking the scheme off its list of recognized upstream due diligence mechanisms. ITSCI had failed to submit an independent assessment of its alignment with the OECD guidelines in time. When the organization eventually released an independent audit in June 2023, it failed to assess ITSCI’s activities in Congo, focusing solely on coltan production in Rwanda. The RMI has offered to pay for three site visits in Congo, including in Rubaya, but ITSCI has so far not agreed. (“Site visits outside alignment assessments are not explicitly required,” said the ITSCI spokesperson, who noted the terms of such a visit are nonetheless under negotiation with RMI.)

“They are holding everyone hostage,” an industry insider close to the RMI process told Foreign Policy. “There is so much pressure on the RMI to capitulate and say we need this system. But this isn’t a technical issue.” To many experts and industry insiders, the resurgence of the M23 conflict has at least had the benefit of clarifying the situation. “The system cannot withstand what it was built for. It can’t withstand the conflict. We are back to square one.”

Breaking ITSCI’s quasi-monopoly is often presented as the solution in minerals circles, but SMB’s switch to Better Mining solved none of the problems in Rubaya and only created more confusion. Better Mining’s for-profit business model and its reliance on technology make it hard to scale and mean it is explicitly designed for larger companies with capital, not artisanal miners. “The problem with all these initiatives is that no one is there to control them,” said de Brier, the IPIS researcher.

Who is supposed to exert this control is part of the problem. Much like the fragmented nature of the supply chain, the nebulous ecosystem of public and private actors involved in responsible sourcing means that responsibility befalls no one in particular. In a July 2023 report, the GAO noted that the number of companies filing conflict minerals disclosures to the SEC had been steadily declining year-on-year since 2014, in part because “companies perceive that they are unlikely to face enforcement action by the SEC if they do not comply.”

Pickles noted that, unlike Dodd-Frank, the European Union’s own conflict minerals regulation, which came into force in 2021, avoided the trap of focusing only on Congo but equally fell for industry schemes such as ITSCI. “I’ve spoken to the competent authorities of three member states, and they said that the reports they receive from companies don’t tell them anything. They don’t actually know what’s happening along the supply chain,” she said. “So where does that leave us?”

For Congolese, ending this hypocrisy is a necessary first step but requires trust and support on the part of international partners. “The Congolese government has its own traceability system. All the necessary documents are delivered by Congolese state agencies. They tell you where the minerals come from just as reliably as ITSCI’s tags, which is to say it’s not perfect but it’s no worse,” Muhima said. “The same state agents deliver these documents and implement ITSCI’s program—for free I might add, since ITSCI doesn’t pay for them. What needs to be improved urgently is their payment.”

These lessons are relevant beyond the specifics of the 3T supply chain. The attention around cobalt—the conflict mineral du jour thanks to its use in electric vehicle batteries—is a case in point. While there is no conflict in the area where cobalt is extracted, working conditions and child labor have been discussed in much the same way as conflict minerals were back in the 2000s: in decontextualized and sometimes inaccurate reports that fail to examine the complex ways in which minerals interact with people’s livelihoods. Instead, such reports paint artisanal mining as illegitimate, something to eliminate. They have been used to justify land grab by large mining companies whose supply chains are easily traceable for end-user companies.

“We haven’t learned from our experience with diamonds or 3T minerals. With cobalt, it’s as if those experiences never existed,” said Joanne Lebert, the executive director of IMPACT, a nonprofit organization working on natural resource governance. “Instead of supporting communities, we’re just monitoring. There is no connection in my view between a clean supply chain and governance and security outcomes. Maybe you take kids out of your supply chain, but they’ll go to agriculture, to domestic work. They’ll go to another mine. They’ll sneak in at night. Clean supply chain is about eliminating the risk and not necessarily about doing good. And it’s the doing good we have to get at.”

Following the same pattern, an EU law aimed at preventing products linked to deforestation from entering the European market is pushing coffee companies toward industrial producers able to generate the paperwork and sidelining small farmers from Ethiopia to Brazil. Private companies will always take the shortcut, while black markets, exploitation, and conflict feed on exclusion.

Whether Western consumers like it or not, artisanally mined minerals will continue to find their way into the supply chains that fuel the energy transition and consumer products. Investing in mining communities’ welfare, education, and businesses is indispensable.

Museni is still living in the refugee camp on the outskirts of Goma with her husband and young children. Surrounded, the provincial capital has been struggling to absorb and provide for the constant new waves of displaced families reaching the city as the M23 is inching closer.

Even as evidence of Rwanda’s support to the rebellion has been mounting, the country has still not been sanctioned. In February, the EU signed an agreement “to nurture sustainable and resilient value chains for critical raw materials” with the Rwandan government, calling the country “a major player on the world’s tantalum extraction.” Congolese President Félix Tshisekedi described the deal as a “provocation in very bad taste.”

In Nyabibwe, Kulimuchi took me on a final walk around the town, waving around at the myriad businesses and hard-working people in the streets. “No one here has a bank account, for example. We can’t save. We can’t build,” he said. “We don’t require much—a road to Bukavu, a little boost, you know. Then, we’ll take it from there.”

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bievre · 2 days ago

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these dipshits. so far here are their suggestions for how i can move my (own) money out of the bank that derisked me and into a new account so that i can access and spend it:

structure the transaction (illegal, will be auto-flagged by their AML compliance algo, will trigger another activity report about me, i am not currently allowed to transfer money at all anyway)

write myself a check for part of it (normally legal & i tried, but have subsequently discovered that due to the previous activity report[s], this now also falls under AML auto-flags and may already have triggered, or currently be triggering, subsequent activity reports about me)

close the old account early (the old bank is legally forbidden to relinquish my funds until their initial 30 day notice is up, so this would make my situation worse inasmuch as it would be the same except i also wouldn't have sporadic access to cash withdrawals)

also because they cannot legally tell me that an activity report was filed at all or that this is the reason both accounts are restricted, i still do not actually know if they're just going to close the new account out entirely and tell me to piss off lol but i do know they've now lied to me about the reason the partial check won't cash (it's on their end) so that's nice. fondly remembering my mandatory personal finance class where zero words were spoken about AML/CTF compliance but the instructor somehow always made time to condescend to me about the relative cheapness of beans & financing a 1994 geo prizm.

#im not in anxiety hellzone abt this anymore so we can have a laff

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vaningyen · 1 year ago

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2024: a globalizáció vége

Megjósolni a jövőt nyilván nem annyira egyszerű, úgyhogy egész jó esélye van annak, hogy faszságokat fogok írni, de az is lehet, hogy pár meglátásnak azért lesz értelme.

a wto adatai szerint már 2018 után is csak alig nőtt a világkereskedelem tonnákban mérve, aztán jött a covid, putyin háborúja, ami a középpontba helyezte egyre több helyen a decoupling, a derisking és a friendshoreing fogalmát. ez pl. azon is látszódik, hogy a legfrissebb adatok szerint az usa legfontosabb kereskedelmi partnere mexikó, amit kanada követ, míg kína csak a harmadik. a trump alatt bevezetett vámok ma is élnek, sőt azokhoz újabb kereskedelmi korlátozások kapcsolódtak. az ira és a chips act egészen nyilvánvalóan protekcionista lépések, melyek célja az importhelyettesítés.

európa ugye leginkább az orosz kapcsolatot vágta el, de azért miután kiderült, hogy nem versenyképes az elektromos autók terén, egyre inkább hajlik arra is, hogy kína felé is korlátozza piacát és inkább csak hisztizik amiatt, hogy amerika mennyi támogatást önt a saját iparára. meg persze van a karbonvám és társai, ami a klímára hivatkozva védené az európai piacot. azonban európa nem igazán rendelkezik nyersanyagokkal és azt is örömmel veszi, ha a szennyező iparágak valhol máshol vannak.

kína az ingatlanszektor válságára azt a választ találta ki, hogy növeli az exportját, mert hszi szerint a fogyasztói társadalom valami rossz, nyugati, dekadens dolog, így a belső kereslet élénkítéséről szó sem lehet. a kínai feldolgozóipar és gazdaság ráadásul szintén brutális nyersanyagimportra szorul. szóval kína szívesen folytatná a globalizációt, ahol az állami vagy államilag támogatott kínai cégek versenyelőnyben vannak az állami be nem avatkozás politikáját vivő nyugati cégekkel szemben.

gazdasági értelemben ez a világ jóval több mint fele, a többiek - japán, india, oroszország, közel-kelet - egész egyszerűen nem tényezők vagy csak bizonyos területeken fontosak, mint tajvan és a csipek vagy szaúdarábia és oroszország, meg az olaj. ezen gazdaságok többsége azért inkáb kereskedne, mint kelet és dél-kelet-ázsia vagy a nagy nyersanyagtermelők, mint az oroszok, kanada, ausztrális és a közel-kelet. mindegy is, ez a bekezdés inkább csak mellékszál, de mondjuk india azért annyira nem akar kinyílni, ha nem muszáj.

az sem olyan nagyon meglepő, hogy a világkereskedelem nagyja a tengeren zajlik, ahol azért van egy pár pont, aminek a lezárása komoly gondokat okoz. ilyen a szuezi csatorna és a vörös-tenger másik végén található bab-el-mandeb-szoros, amit ha jól értem a húsziknak többé-kevésbé csak sikerült lezárni, bár talán az indiába és kínába tartó orosz tankereknek nincs miért aggódniuk. ugyanez azonban már nem biztos, hogy igaz az európába tartó, kínai árut szállító dán konténerhajókra.

van persze előnye, ha az ember előbb nézi meg az adatokat és utólag kezd el okoskodni, de szerencsére én képes vagyok megmagyarázni ezt is. szerintem a kereskelem arányának 2022-es megugrása csak statisztikai hiba, az egyre szaporodó korlátozások miatti kerülőutak eredménye. én legalábbis nem nagyon találkoztam olyan információval, ami alapján 2022-ben hihetetlenül nagy új lendületet kapott volna a világkereskedelem. mindegy.

a tézisem nagyjából az, hogy egy egyébként is deglobalizálódó világban, ahol egyre több ország vezet be protekcionista intézkedéseket, a vörös-tenger blokádja tovább ront a helyzeten. mindez európának különösen rossz, magyarországnak meg még annál is inkább. most talán úgy tűnik, hogy a konvojosdi nem működik a vörös-tengeren, de abban biztosak lehetünk, hogy egy trump vezette amerika meg se próbálná megvédeni az eu-kína kereskedelmet.

azt meg remélem nem kell bővebben kifejteni, hogy a bezárkózás egyre több szereplő részéről miért nem ígér sok jót a jövőre nézve. boldog új évet mindenkinek, remélem végül nem lesz igazam

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babyawacs · 3 days ago

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@manager @management #ontopic #basf @basf undertheaxiom of large installations investment risk on market dependency int egrating the lowerlevels of productiondepths into a competito rs market playing with govt+private s c a l i n g any in vestme nt of thistype inthis productionchain level seems more like a lure to copy procedures and know how to scale it more efficiently evenmore with decoupli ng ahead whilethisis long understood and a nobrainer itis the question how the abscence of markets where was a greater risk. management strategically any effort to risk reduction less dance on volcano investment efforts to derisk is a nobrainer i f such market access is worth it implies timeframes of inves tments i f the move occurs which procedures and modernisation will still outcompete scaled + copied what is invested if the risk event occurs : if itis a sellout of crownjewels already itis farmoreproblematic invest ment if derisking wasnot evenpossible the investor i s the lunch

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gcworld · 5 days ago

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World News Roundup for February 2025

1. Economic Headwinds Mount for Western Economic Systems

The US president has been acting quickly to stave off massive breakdowns in the American Economic ecosystem. A bevy of tariffs have been both implemented and threatened, along with an impressive array of executive orders and internal cuts. 25 percent and 10 percent additional tariffs have been levelled at China and Bharat respectively, RT News reports. Recently, US manufacturing data revealled a larger than expected manufacturing collapse of 0.9 percent, sitting American manufacturing at a five year low, SRN News reports. The costs for production has continued to skyrocket, putting finished goods beyond the pricepoint of citizens.

Americans are simply not buying and high interest rates ensure that the world isn't able to buy either. As America has begun to pivot from its "Iron-clad" support of Kiyv, the Ukraine president predicts his military offensive could not last beyond a 6-month threshold without US military spending, Al-Jazeera reports. Western states like the US are reaching for the rafters to find a way to save what is left of their economies ravaged by the Ukraine Conflict, sanctions, economic malfeasance, Sino-derisking and the endgame theory of empire.

Germany's car industries continues to tank as the US overtakes China to be Deutschland's top trade partner, AP News reports. Germany's new government is hoped to save what is left of the economy. Even still, new power pricing overhauls threatens production, Bloomberg L.P. reports. Farmer protests have also continued across Western Europe and UK as new laws and international trade agreements eat into livelihoods. Even Bulgaria has pushed back against Brussels with protestors storming EU Offices in opposition to the use of the Euro, as the Eurozone becomes a less viable market, Times of India reports.

US farmers also remonstrated after USAID Suspensions cut into their profits to supply the Global South through "aid programs" that amounted to a major commercial market, Los Angeles Times reported. The move demonstrates that Western agribusiness deeply relies on food insecurities in the Global South and food aid programs for survival. Walmart, one of America's top retailers has forcast poor growth amid major economic uncertainty, restructuring, a DEI rollback consumer boycott and pending tariffs that could slash future profits, Market Watch reports.

2 USAID Claims of Terror Funding Echoed By Global South States Receiving Aid.

An American lawmaker has reportedly affirmed that USAID, the US State Department agency tasked with supplying aid to foreign interests, has engaged in supporting terrorists, MSN reports. In an interview with Arise News, a member of the Anti-Boko Haram taskforce in Nigeria revealled that villagers testified to "white men" in helicopters dropping off guns, supplies and other aid in terrorist occupied areas. A method used widely in Black American neighborhoods in the USA, where boxes of guns were dropped off for local gangs during the Latin American Drug Wars that devastated local communities during the American Crack Epidemic.

The funding cuts come at a critical time in Africa where externally-funded mercenary groups have begun ravaging disperate parts of the region. NTV Kenya reports that local police have recently put down a skirmish by the Oromo Liberation Army in Marsabit and Isolo counties. This comes in the wake of Nairobi hosting Sudan RSF leaders in the organization of a plan to further balkanize Sudan.

The balkanization of African states has been a critical formula in the neocolonial strategy post independence. Puppet/Proxy dictators have been key in leading "tribalized' rebellions that act as deep cover for balkanization projects that lend easier access to resources and exterminate and relocate populations from key mineral rich areas for external corporate or foreign interests. It is reported that M23 the rebel group destabilizing the mineral rich regions of the Democratic Republic of the Congo have invaded as far as Bukavu, further pushing out certain populations. CGTN is reporting also the presence of Ugandan troops, a nation among those who received comparable US Aid.

The critical situation has pushed DR Congo leadership to direct meetings with AES member Mali for strategy and support. The resurgence of mercenary armies and rebel groups reflect the destabilization in the Western socioeconomic landscape that needs immidiate results and resources for survival. It is important to note that both DRC and Sudan were significant recipients of USAID "support" before its suspension. Somalia, Ethiopia, Syria, Jordan, and Afghanistan are also top recipients. Ironically, almost all destabilization hot spots in Africa and West Asia received the bulk of USAID funding, including Uganda and Mozambique, Newsweek reports.

3. Iran to Become Most influential State in West Asia As Influence and Innovation Grows

Recently, Iran reported that it had launched over 10 Satellites in 2024, Mehr News Agency noted. The move underscores Iran's growing dominance in the area of technology, space and aeronautics as well as military artillery with hypersonic weapons and state of the art drone technology.

China's massive DeepSeek revelations demonstrated that the world may be far more advanced than postulated in popular theory and mainstream media. Iran not only demonstrates its capacity through its facility with these technologies and innovations, but that It has the capacity to be a leader in West Asia even under sanctions outside of the Western economic system.

The rise of Iran as a major financial, energy technological and military leaders in the Middle East would eclipse the limited means of Saudi Arabia in its stagnating relationship with the West. As the West becomes less viable to the world, the function of Saudi Arabia in the Middle East and Africa will dissipate. Saudi will have to think fast to reinvent itself. Further skirmishes and conflicts in Africa and West Asia will simply not be enough. The balance of power is undoubtedly tipping away from the Arab world toward the Persians and other West Asian factions in the MENA region.

Many Arab groups in the Islamic world have been content to broker deals with the West and manage relationships with African, West Asian and Southeast Asian states and factions for decades. However this influence has begun to wane. The breakdown of Western powers coupled with the overabundance of "Islamic jihadist" mercenary groups has left an unpleasant taste in the region. Harvesting grounds in Africa and West Asia for poor, destitute, war aged-young men will evaporate under better governance and socioeconomic stability promised by new regional and world blocs and alliances.

More states are moving toward sovereignity, stability and economic independence able to weather economic downturns. And states like Iran, Russia and China demonstrate that this can be done even as development continues. Being outside of the Western sphere of influence leaves less and less to be desired to remain in it, especially as the inflated dollar eats up international FX reserves. Not only has dedollarization becone attractive for even the staunches US allies, but also economic re-fortiification away from the traditional core post World War II bloc. This lessens the need for Arab "middle men." BRICS has opened the door for other plans of regional, fiscal organisation and cooperation. It appears Iran is fast becoming the future of the Islamic world.

4. Upheavals, Political Tensions and Chaos Grip West's Asia Allies

In an unprecedented moment in Philippines history, its Vice President was impeached for a host of unproven allegations, AP News reported. The impeachment is being challenged in its highest court as the embattled executive seeks reinstatement for the unfounded charges.

The VP was unpopular among Philippines leadership rather than popular consensus because she accused the president of being a US puppet to help contain the regional superpower. Just recently, the Philippines was involved in yet another South China Sea confrontation with the Sino state vessels/ aircraft, AP News reported. The ongoing confrontations and collissions were unheard of before the US began patrolling the waters and recruiting allies to contain Beijing.

The political turmoil roiling US Asian allies has come in the wake of its containment strategy growing more fierce and confusing over time. Still, local populations and lawmakers push back against unmerited regional discord. South Korea is among the states grappling with political upheavals as its own president sought to deploy martial law and put the nation under the authority of the milirary, which the US jointly controls via a Korean War treaty.

Asian states that often skew more politically pragmatic have remonstrated against the attempts to leverage their state in proxy against China. Many, including Taiwan see Ukraine and its unfortunate leader as a cautionary tale of paradise lost and betrayal.

The Philippine leader was criticized for her stance regarding the South China Sea which she rarely supported the pro-US president 's anti-China stance. A stance that had left him with a low 2024 approval rating, but reportedly better numbers in 2025, Philstar reports. While US Asia ally leadership has been compliant, its citizens have voted a more neutral position.

Japan has also struggled to maintain the US containment policy as it has been forced to sacrifice the future and economic stability of the state and its own people to remain in conference. Just recently, Japanese steel-maker, Nippon was blocked by even its liberal Democratic allies in Washington from a US Steel acquisition. Still, Tokyo has had to sell $61.9 billion dollars in US Securities to survive as it slips in key indicators, as US treasuries buying fell again in Q4 2024. Both Korea and Japanese tech stocks plummeted after the DeepSeek reveal in early February. While Asian partners have sought to placate Western allies, losses continue to mount.

5. US-Rossiya Talks Focus Ukraine Future and Sanctions in Saudi Arabia

An important step toward dissolution of the Ukraine Conflict took place in Riyadh, in Saudi Arabia. Attended by the US and Rossiya, ministers gathered to hammer out a deal as the Ukraine proxy has begun to collapse. Kiyvs unelected president's approval rating has been questioned as lawmakers protested the premiere in parliament, RT news reports.

However even as Kiyv begins to fade, EU leaders unveiled a new round of sanctions against Rossiya, AFP reported. The EU has been presented to be at loggerheads with Washington on how best to wrap up the Ukraine conflict. Sanctions have backfired in the Eurozone and UK and those states have grappled to reconfigure to a war economy. The military industrial complex has helped to keep the bloc afloat even as other industries shutter.

It will be difficult to balance shutting down the war effort with saving massively damaged economies in advanced stages of deindustrialization. US News reports that Germany has just voted-in a new government with significant far-right leanings as other large EU economies struggle to balance budgets and stave off economic collapse.

While more loss is inevitable, Washington and Brussels must decide which will weather the brunt of that loss. Such a decision will likely impact the fortunes of the US, Eurozone and UK far into the future. So the decision must be deliberate. Without question the US hopes removing Rossiya sanctions will delay the BRICS pivot and save the US dollar. It has become clear that the world is preparing a new socioeconomic front, so the US must move quickly The Eurozone will likely have to be the sacrificial lamb to buy the dollar more time.

6. Latin American Gangs Now Designated as Terrorist, As US Agribusiness Opportunities Dry Up

Weeks before the US inauguration in January, Americans reported seeing unidentified drones in the sky, The Independent reported. Apparently, Mexican citizens also witnessed UAVs circling the skies during a similar period, Reuters reported. In January and February the Mexican government allowed the deployment of two US UAV reconnaissance missions. Since that time the Mexican government has confirmed the deployment was at their request and more US UAV flights are scheduled with the CIA, the AP reports. While the general news was focused on immigrant flights, the US designated gangs as terror groups and struck down a policy that prevented US officials from bribing foreign governments.

The changes were significant because it changes designations for how the US battles internal and external gangs. This means gangs in the United States, Haiti, Mexico and Latin America have been re-classified as terrorist enemy combatants. This brings with it the use of the military industrial complex and the offensive means executed in war conflict. Such offensives directly effect production, development and growth which could effect China's ambitions in Latin America and US regional hegemony.

Additionally, the re-classification makes it possible to house domestic and international gang members in extra-state facilities and detention camps like Guantanamo Bay. The Salvadorean president who has aligned himself with Washington has offered his CECOT prisons as holding and detention cells for "gang memebers," FirstPost reports. In late 2024, US-Backed factions of the Sinaloa Cartel/Gang kidnapped a rival member for extradition to the US for trial, El Pais News reported. While the feat broke all international law, it underscored the savage fight for power growing in Latin America. The US is hoping to hold on to its leadership in the region and gangs play an important role in supporting or undermining those goals.

These developments also illustrate that US citizens might also become targets of US military or police surveillance via UAVs. For weeks, the Biden Administration remained mum on the sightings until the new government confirmed that the drones were authorized, BBC reports.

Latin America will doubtlessly become a battle ground as it, like West Asia and Africa present fertile development opportunities. As US agricultural fortunes dry up, the need for cheap agribusiness labor has evaporated. Even the Mercosur deal will not provide the lift Latin America can get supplying the BRICS and supporting more complex manufacturing capacity from Asia's largest economy. China has been keen to incentivise these regions while Russia asserts itself as a capable military partner for states seeking stability and an end to destabilization and forever wars.

Geochange is on:

+TikTok @geochangeworld

+Podcastle.ai +Odysee.com

○ htps://www.tumblr.com/gcworld

○ https://www.quora.com/profile/GeoChange-World

○ http://odysee.com/geochangeworld

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mindcelebrations2021 · 5 days ago

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Safe Work Environment

EAPs contribute to derisking a company by promoting early intervention, improving employee mental health, mitigating conflicts, reducing staff turnover, and ensuring compliance with legal and ethical standards. By investing in the well-being of employees, your company can create a healthier, more productive, and safer work environment, minimizing potential risks and liabilities - therapists online free.

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garyh2628 · 8 days ago

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The Preeminence of The Global Structure Network Ltd.

We are the world’s most Valuable Modern Selfcare, Consumer Goods, and Consumer Healthcare Asset, Brand, Culture and Mega force for Progress.

INVESTING IN PEOPLE, TRUST AND DERISKING, AND HEALTHY

We Discover. We Make. We take the Lead - Redefining the Boundaries of Ambition

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Investors, Stakeholders and Brands can directly contact us here:

[email protected] or [email protected]

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(Men's Health, Consumer Health and Development, Nutraceuticals, Nutricosmetics, Organic, Nutrition, Agriculture, Complementary and Integrative Health, Value-Based-and-Integrated Care, Food is Medicine, Medically Tailored Meal Programmes, Life Science OTC, Wellness, Wellness Infrastructure and Human Services upstream and downstream interventions just to name a few)

Opportunity, Affordability, and Equality of Opportunity - For the latest Sector News, click here: https://www.gsdiandadvocacy.co.uk/news

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A Culture of Triumphant Living, The Quantified Self, The Institution of Household Efficiency & Operational Resilience

Disease Prevention, Health Promotion, Cultural Transformation, and Quality Enhancement

Knowledge, Healthy Resilience, Healthy Longevity, Operational Resilience, and Efficacy

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At the heart of this surge are The Global Structure Network Limited and The Global Structure Diamond International and Advocacy www.gsdiandadvocacy.co.uk, powered by my 20+ years of Healthy Structural Performance, Operational Resilience, Efficacy, and a strong Value Proposition. As a result, we are widely recognised by Consumers, Investors, Institutions, and Stakeholders as the driving force (The Power) behind the global Modern Selfcare, Consumer Goods, and Consumer Health economies—both at the Consumer and policy levels.

Modern Self-care economies:

Men’s Health

Consumer Health and Development

Nutraceuticals

Nutricosmetics

Organic

Nutrition

Agriculture

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Food is Medicine

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Medically Tailored Meal Programmes

Life Science OTC

Wellness, and Wellness Infrastructure

The Brain Economy

Human Services upstream and downstream interventions, just to name a few

We're facing lots of different challenges but also opportunities to make things better. What all these situations have in common is that they involve "People." That's why Modern Selfcare, Consumer Goods and Consumer Health in service to Development, Health and Wealth Creation at the Consumer level is so important. https://www.gsdiandadvocacy.co.uk/peoples-possibilities

For Investors and Stakeholders, The Global Structure Network Limited and The Global Structure Diamond International and Advocacy www.gsdiandadvocacy.co.uk and the shift to Development, Health and Wealth Creation we enabled in the global Consumer landscape to support a Culture of Triumphant Living is seen as an Innovation we’ve developed beyond the Medicines themselves.

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This shift is paving the way for a new policy approach, enabling policymakers to identify key factors and connections at the Consumer level while gaining deeper insight into the systemic interactions that influence Consumer decision-making. It also supports the creation of more effective policy tools, grounded in a strong understanding of Consumer actions, to drive meaningful and lasting impact.

As a result, The Global Structure Network Limited and The Global Structure Diamond International and Advocacy www.gsdiandadvocacy.co.uk play a crucial role in enhancing policy effectiveness and delivering Intended Value to Consumers, Investors and CEOs. We help expand the scope of policy implementation from a narrow, singular focus to a broader, multi-dimensional approach that addresses multiple policy areas.

The Potential is Limitless – Shifting Profit Pools

Over the last 20 years, the Consumer Products sector has seen a steady fall in total shareholder returns (TSRs), going from one of the highest to one of the lowest in the industry. The Global Structure Network Limited and The Global Structure Diamond International and Advocacy are leading the way in reversing this trend. By reshaping the global Consumer landscape and shifting the focus towards segments with the highest growth potential, we are driving a new era of growth and investment opportunity.

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This shift is also shaping new industry segments, paving the way for the growth of the Longevity Industry and others. It has sparked significant investment into advancing research on longevity mechanisms, human ageing models, and skin aging processes. https://www.gsdiandadvocacy.co.uk/our-major-areas-of-foci-and-investment-in-aging

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For investors and stakeholders worldwide, The Global Structure Network Limited, The Global Structure Diamond International and Advocacy www.gsdiandadvocacy.co.uk, and our Value Proposition are seen as key forces in bridging cultural fault lines—particularly in areas such as Purpose Alignment and Decision-Making capabilities. For investors, we represent the Cultural Thesis for achieving Intended Value, providing a strategic foundation for success in this new global Consumer landscape and within the Modern Selfcare Economies. https://theglobalstructurenetwork.com/f/culture-is-at-the-red-hot-centre-of-commercial-advantage

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The global wellness industry is experiencing significant growth, as at 2023 it was Valued at $6.3 trillion. Within this expansive market, the health supplements sector is anticipated to reach $300 billion by 2028. This surge is driven by increasing consumer interest in health and well-being, leading to a diverse range of products and services aimed at enhancing quality of life.

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The Global Structure Network Limited and The Global Structure Diamond International and Advocacy www.gsdiandadvocacy.co.uk, driven by our key focus areas and my 20+ years of Healthy Structural Performance, Operational Resilience, and Efficacy, serve as the catalyst for unlocking investment opportunities across the global Consumer landscape, valued in the trillions of dollars. The competitive advantage we offer to CEOs and investors is truly unmatched and unparalleled.

We are ready for a Global Commercial Conquest, focused on our Modern Selfcare, Consumer Goods and Consumer Health Branded Products, Services and Capital commercial agenda in service to Development, Health and Wealth Creation to support a "Culture of Triumphant Living."

I extend an invitation to CEOs, Stakeholders, Brands, and Investors to join me in this Commercial Opportunity. Together, we can seize the opportunities that our success has created and provide new and innovative Consumer Goods, Consumer Healthcare, Wellness and Wellness Infrastructure and Modern Selfcare Products and Services and Capital with unique and distinct Value Proposition. https://theglobalstructurenetwork.com/f/a-growing-long-term-opportunity-set

Success comes from working side by side with our Policymakers, CEOs, Stakeholders and Consumers and pushing boundaries together.

The core of our expansion includes our Commercial Strategy and it is focused on; We Discover. We Make. We take the Lead: This translates into four lucrative Investment Areas within The Global Structure Network Limited and The Global Structure Diamond International and Advocacy www.gsdiandadvocacy.co.uk :

A fully functioning Global Modern Selfcare and Consumer Health upstream and downstream Platform

A Global marketplace for Modern Selfcare, Consumer Goods, and Consumer Health branded Products, Services, and Capital that will lead the frontier of these emerging trends.

A fully functioning Global Health, Development and Empowerment campus or common where Consumers will have an opportunity to mingle with our Modern Selfcare, Consumer Health and Health policymakers, researchers, the Multinational Institutions and CEOs' offices in towns and cities all over the world that we are an extension of, The Founder’s Gallery, and a lot more for bringing the Modern Selfcare, Consumer Health and Empowerment trends to life.

The Global Structure Network Limited, along with The Global Structure Diamond International and Advocacy www.gsdiandadvocacy.co.uk, will also serve as a recruitment service for the Modern Selfcare sectors.

We are always seeking opportunities to connect and partner with CEOs, Farms, Farmers, and other stakeholders to advance our strategic priorities. Often, potential connections may not be immediately apparent, so we encourage brands, CEOs, Farms, investors, and stakeholders to reach out to me via email to schedule a meeting and explore potential collaborations. https://theglobalstructurenetwork.com/f/what%E2%80%99s-the-deal-with-the-new-global-modern-self-care-landscape

Achieving commercial success requires building intentional and thoughtful partnerships to drive the enhanced profits and investment returns you seek. The Global Structure Network Limited and The Global Structure Diamond International and Advocacy www.gsdiandadvocacy.co.uk — are open to connections, collaborations, and partnerships. Engaging with us can confer a level of status and importance among Consumers, CEOs, and Policymakers.

I look forward to directly engaging with investors, farms, brands, and CEOs from all sectors, including Infotech. Feel free to contact me at [email protected] or [email protected]. https://www.gsdiandadvocacy.co.uk/the-consumer-landscape-has-a-big-opportunity-in-the-global-structure-network-limited-and-the-global-structure-diamond-international-and-advocacy

Proposals

In founding The Global Structure Network Limited and The Global Structure Diamond International and Advocacy www.gsdiandadvocacy.co.uk, and subsequently pioneering this new economic sector, I have attracted both admirers and critics. However, I'm pleased to note that I have garnered more admirers, particularly among the leading figures within our grand strategy ecosystem and beyond. Our achievements, along with my own meritocratic ascent, continue to evolve as we advance in expansion and global commercialisation.

I’m aware that several proposals are circulating, with me at their core. If you have a proposal, feel free to reach out—I’m open to opportunities that support a Culture of Triumphant Living and reinforce the work of The Global Structure Network Limited and The Global Structure Diamond International and Advocacy www.gsdiandadvocacy.co.uk. Together, we can deliver on Progress Promises, which call for breakthrough thinking and pushing beyond current boundaries.

Your Centre for Modern Selfcare and Consumer Health Commercial Excellence and Your Modern Selfcare and Consumer Health Root of Trust,

Gary (The Founder's Gallery)

The Founder’s Gallery (Centre for Modern Selfcare including Human Services Commercial Excellence)– Disease Prevention, Health Promotion, Cultural Transformation, and Quality Enhancement - (Policy Chair for Global Modern Selfcare, Consumer Goods, and Consumer Health, dedicated to Wealth Creation, Health, and Development in support of a Culture of Triumphant Living.) https://theglobalstructurenetwork.com/message-from-the-founder

Associated Sites:

www.gsdiandadvocacy.co.uk

LinkedIn:

https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-global-structure-network/

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