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Environmental researchers have warned that post-pandemic growth in infrastructure spending is causing illegal sand mining to damage some of the world’s most vulnerable lakes and rivers.
Sand, mixed with cement to make concrete, is the most widely consumed material on Earth, apart from water. In countries like this there is a small threat of the virus as well China sparks renewed construction activity. They fear that gangs of criminals who play a leading role in the industry will dredge even more sand from delicate ecosystems.
“From now on, we will see governments include a lot of funding for infrastructure to boost the economy, which will lead to high demand for sand and gravel,” said Pascal Peduzzi, head of the UN Environment Program’s Global Resource Information Database. Geneva.
Peduzi explained that the lakes and rivers were damaged as a result of the exploitation of the sand, which could change the course of the rivers, lower the level of the lakes, erode the riverbanks and break the fauna. “In some places, there has been a very high load in these environments, it has caused a total ecological catastrophe,” he said.
Kiran Pereira, author Residual stories: amazing truths about the crisis around the world, said many large projects were underway under the cover of the global health crisis.
“Covid has had the effect of increasing the amount [of sand] that is coming out, “he said.” Many governments have used the pandemic as an excuse to carry out projects that were not going to go through, such as land reclamation. “
The sand found under lakes and rivers is better for making concrete than sea or desert sand, as it is too rounded to bind to cement. Although sand is abundant, it takes thousands of years to form through erosion.
Reserves are depleting rapidly as sand is extracted faster than can be renewed. Because extraction is poorly regulated around the world and mining is done informally, gangs of organized criminals are predominant in many areas.
A paper published in the magazine in March Extraction Industries and Society he stressed how the sand mining industry was “plagued by intense illegalisation, strong black markets and intense violence”.
There is little global data on the problem, mainly because the sand is usually extracted near the place where it is used.
“It’s the most exploited natural resource on the planet, and yet we know very little about where it comes from and who uses it,” said Dave Tickner, an advisor to the WWF conservation team. “It’s an amazing low-profile problem given its importance in our daily lives.”
The problem is the most serious in China, the world’s largest consumer of sand.
Beijing has relied on state-owned industrial and infrastructure spending to boost the post-pandemic recovery. According to PNV data, China accounts for 58% of world demand for sand and gravel.
Attracting high demand and high profits has attracted criminals who resort to elaborate schemes to hide their activities. They often operate at night using boats with a water dredging device.
The crackdown by the Chinese authorities on the illegal exploitation of sand in the Yangtze River has found more than two dozen gangs of more than 200 people and more than Rmb17m ($ 2.6 million) this year.
The country’s interest in protecting the environment is being prepared to host a UN biodiversity summit this year. “They [China] they have actually increased monitoring and enforcement. They really tightened up, ”Pereira said.
However, environmentalists say what has been revealed is that it is only part of the broader illegal mining industry.
In China, sand extraction is in full swing freshwater lakes such as Poyang and Dongting have lowered water levels, increased drought risk and endangered local wildlife.
China’s unsatisfactory demand for sand has also taken a geopolitical side: the aggressive exploitation of sand around Taiwan’s Matsu Island has become a significant point of friction between Beijing and Taipei.
China has also used a large amount of sand to build man-made islands, store military bases and strengthen Beijing’s claims in disputed waters.
Yu Bowen, a researcher at the Association of Chinese Aggregates, said coastal provinces like Fujian, across the strait from Taiwan, have illegal markets.
“Companies offer to take charge of an area [of the sea] and then it’s up to them to use it, ”he said. “It could be a bucket or 10 to get the sand out. That makes it harder to repress. ”
Mette Bendixen, an assistant professor of environment and geography at the University of Copenhagen in Denmark, said that the main site for sand demand will move from Asia to Africa in the coming decades.
“Western countries have increased the need for sand, Asian countries have an increasing need and African countries will have an increased need for sand in the next 10 years,” he said. “Maybe in a few years you can see incredibly similar extraction practices.”
Additional report by Emma Zhou in Beijing
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