Chile

By Staff - Trade Unions for Energy Democracy, May 9, 2023

Last week, we looked at the Boric administration’s launch of the National Lithium Strategy, the creation of a National Lithium Company, and some initial responses by trade unions. In this bulletin, we’ll highlight clips of interviews from diverse trade union perspectives on the role of the labour movement in the lithium sector. 

By Amy Westervelt - The Intercept, May 8, 2023

In 2019, Thea Riofrancos was splitting her time between researching the social and environmental impacts of lithium mining in Chile and organizing for a rapid energy transition away from fossil fuels in the United States. A political science professor at Providence College and member of the Climate and Community Project, Riofrancos was struck by the contrast: Lithium is essential to the batteries that make electric vehicles and renewable energy work, but mining inflicts its own environmental damage. “Here I am in Chile, in the Atacama Desert, seeing these mining-related harms, and then there I go in the U.S. advocating for a rapid transition. How do I align these two goals?” Riofrancos said. “And is there a way to have a less extractive energy transition?”

When she went looking for research that would help answer that question, she found none, at least not for the transportation sector, which was her area of focus. “I saw forecast after forecast that assumed basically a binary of the future,” she said. “Either we stay with the fossil fuel status quo and the existential crisis that that is causing for the planet and all of its people. Or we transition to an electrified, renewably powered future, but that doesn’t really change anything about how these sectors or economic activities are organized.”

Riofrancos wanted to look at multiple ways to design an electrified future and understand what the costs and impacts of different scenarios might be. So she linked up with other Climate and Community Project researchers and put together a report mapping out four potential pathways to electrification for the transportation sector. Titled “Achieving Zero Emissions With More Mobility and Less Mining,” the report concluded that even relatively small, easy-to-achieve shifts like reducing the size of cars and their batteries could deliver big returns: a 42 percent reduction in the amount of lithium needed in the U.S., even if the number of cars on the road and the frequency with which people drive stayed the same.

It’s the sort of thing politicians and electrification advocates need to think through now, when decisions can be made to guide the energy transition in one direction or another. It’s also critical to an underdiscussed component of climate action: demand for products and services and the role energy plays in fulfilling those demands. Which connects right up to another topic that American politicians don’t want to touch with a 10-foot pole: consumption.

By Roberto Lobos and Horacio Fuentes - Constramet, April 2023

President Gabriel Boric presented his National Lithium Strategy, the great absentee in his speech were the workers of Chile, and we can not fail to point out our concern about it. This is why we want to express our opinion on the national chain and express some of the ideas of the workers' world.

In the more than twenty minutes that the President's speech lasted, several questions remained for the world of labour. The decision to move forward with the creation of a National Lithium Company, a campaign promise cast into doubt less than a week ago by the same government team, was welcomed. Yesterday's position, much more in line with the sentiments of the workers, is weighted for its positive value. It is clearly a decision that will have to be defended against the more neoliberal positions, which will oppose the strengthening of the state, which for us still needs to be delimited and clarified in greater depth.

The decision to transform Chile into the "main Lithium producer in the world" is an important bet; accompanying the energy transition process together with Green Hydrogen is part of the strategic development plan that CONSTRAMET and Plebeya have been working on, together with the need to discuss the current situation of copper in Chile in terms of the new energy matrix of the contemporary world-system. We highlight the decision to participate through the State in the entire production process by means of a national company, which is the only possible way towards redistributive economic growth.

With regard to exploration, exploitation and value addition from a "virtuous public-private partnership", there are several questions that plague us. Starting with the content of the link itself. Any process of dialogue between the state and the private sector must include the participation of workers. The greater the participation of the social world in sovereign decision-making in our country, the greater the strength of the public world in the negotiation process, the same for Codelco, today weakened to carry out the plan presented.

By Cuevas Zambrano and Staff - Trade Unions for Energy Democracy, April 2023

Cristián Cuevas Zambrano is a trade union leader and activist of the Chilean left. He is currently director of the Federation of Mining Workers Fetramin and Spokesperson of the National Coordination Committee of Codelco's contractor workers. Previously he was one of the founders of the Confederation of Copper Workers CTC and was its first President for six years. In addition, he was a leader of the Executive Board of the Central Unitaria de Trabajadores CUT Chile.

TUED: Some analysts have taken issue with the characterisation of a "nationalisation" of lithium with historical parallels to the nationalisation of copper. They say it is NOT a classic expropriation but a public-private partnership in which the state-owned company collaborates with the capital. Could you clarify this characterisation for us?

Cristian Cuevas (CC): Nationalisation is a concept that is commonly used to define a process of rescue or expropriation of productive activities in the hands of national or international private capital. This occurred with Law 17.450, promoted by President Salvador Allende, which expressly stated that "the state has absolute, exclusive, inalienable and imprescriptible control of all mines, meadows, metalliferous sands, salt flats, coal and hydrocarbon deposits and other fossil substances, with the exception of surface clays.

The spirit of Allende’s law was aimed at advancing our sovereignty and economic independence, which was completely disregarded during Pinochet's Civil-Military Dictatorship with the enactment of a Constitutional Organic Law that allowed mining concessions to private companies.

However, the Pinochet government issued a supreme decree decreeing lithium as a non-concessionary product given its strategic character in defence (base material that allows the creation of nuclear fusion). Therefore, the Boric administration’s announcements regarding the creation of the national lithium company are intended to allow the State to reclaim the sector and enter into the process of production and development of products made from this raw material.

TUED: In his announcement, Boric stated that the National Lithium Company will articulate public-private partnerships. What are the expected consequences of such a public-private partnership arrangement? What role should trade unions play in developing an alternative?

CC: President Gabriel Boric's announcement reflects the Government's inability to confront the national and foreign business sectors that seek to profit from this important mineral resource, the consequence of which is that the State will not capture for itself 100% of the value generated by lithium, handing the private sector a very good deal. Moreover, this government's surrender is reflected in the declarations of the Minister of Finance Mario Marcel, who only a couple of days ago pointed out as feasible the possibility that some salt flats could be fully exploited by the private sector.

The role that some trade unions have played through public statements, they have come out to reject this public-private partnership because it harms the interests of the State of Chile. However, the weakness of the Chilean trade union movement and the obsession with the CUT is a major constraint for the mobilisation of workers and society in defence of lithium and our common goods.

By Sam Mason, et.al. - COP26 Coalition, February 3, 2022

By various - COP26 Coalition, December 2, 2021

By staff - MorningStar, September 2021

GLOBAL union confederation IndustriALL is taking on a copper mining company, calling for an end to its exploitation of workers.

It has its sights set on the Chilean franchise of the Anglo-Australian BHP multinational company, accusing it of using its corporate muscle to shape laws to work in its favour.

IndustriALL brought together Chilean BHP unions in an online workshop to explore issues of human rights abuses in global supply chains as well as health and safety.

Workers there have been forced to seek redress through the courts, however there are limited mechanisms offering protection to those working in the BHP-operated mines.

“Environmental, social and governance issues are today seen as the biggest risk to the mining industry.

“BHP can no longer evade these issues. It must show respect for workers, communities and the country as a whole,” IndustriALL spokesman Glenn Mpufane said.

Chile is the world’s largest copper producer, yet at least 61 per cent of BHP workers are contractors with precarious employment conditions.

IndustriALL argues that they should be treated more fairly by the multinational company, with copper becoming a crucial resource in the global economy, in high demand for the energy transition.

“As a result, BHP shareholders enjoy attractive returns, but what are the returns for workers, communities and the country as a whole?” Mr Mpufane said.

In August matters spilled over as government-mediated pay talks stalled and workers threatened to ballot for strike action.

The dispute worried world copper markets, despite the price of the metal rocketing to record highs earlier this year.

They wished to avoid a repeat of the 44-day walkout in Escondia, the world’s largest copper mine, in 2017.

IndustriALL’s global campaign urges BHP to enter negotiations “to address its poor record of ill treatment of workers, communities and environmental degradation across its global operations.”

By Pancha Rodríguez - La Via Campesina, April 27, 2021

To celebrate April 17^th, International Day of Peasant Struggle, Capire publishes this interview with Pancha Rodríguez, a member of the Latin American Coordination of Countryside Organizations (Coordinadora Latinoamericana de Organizaciones del Campo—CLOC-La Via Campesina) and of the National Association of Rural and Indigenous Women of Chile (Asociación Nacional de Mujeres Rurales e Indígenas—ANAMURI). Pancha spoke about a long personal and collective journey of struggle for food sovereignty, feminism, and socialism.

First of all, please introduce yourself, looking back at your struggle as a militant and your life story.

I’m Luz Francisca Rodríguez, and everyone knows me as Pancha, which is short for Francisco and Francisca in our country. I come from a rural village that is now part of the city, because as the city expands, it takes over a big part of the countryside and the sectors that used to feed the villages. This forces me to be constantly migrating from the city. I’m someone who doesn’t have much formal education, but I have a great contribution regarding social, political, ideological, and cultural education within the movement.

I’m a flower farmer—this was my contradiction, I produced flowers, not food. When I was young, my work was dedicated to what now may be called a seasonal worker. I was a farmer, a gatherer. We started with the beans and worked our way to the vineyards.

Since I was very little, I had to take care of my home. I worked in different areas, including seasonal work in the countryside and working several different jobs in the winter. I worked for two years at a casino, the post office, and the telegraph office. Then I started to work in the union, at the youth department of the CUT [Unified Workers’ Central]. At age twelve, I joined the Communist Youth, and I’m “old school”: I’m part of the Communist Party, I do militant work in a cell, I pay my dues, I buy the newspaper, I study, I don’t hold big positions in the party, but I’m dedicated to the organization.

I was the woman in charge of the Communist Youth national office in its Central Committee, I worked a lot with the Women’s Front of the Popular Unity for the people’s government, I was one of the sisters working side by side with great women who built the first Women’s Department in the Allende administration, working for the Ministry of Women. Later, when I went underground, I worked with human rights supporting women who were building collectives with partners of political prisoners and victims of forced disappearance, with political prisoners, and family members in exile.

As of 1979, I was no longer underground and I joined the work of the Peasant Confederation of El Surco, now Ranquil, and became the female head. In 1988, when the “no” plebiscite was about to be held, my partner was elected secretary of the International Union of Agriculture, Forests, and Crops, which at the time was part of the World Federation of Trade Unions. I was in charge of the Women’s Matters office. From this process, I went on to build the campaign to commemorate the 500 years of Indigenous, peasant, Black, and grassroots resistance, and then the constitution of the CLOC and La Vía Campesina, always developing work with women in the organization, side by side with young sisters who come from feminist movements and organizations.

By Benjamin Hitchcock Auciello, et. al. - Earthworks, March 31, 2021

It is critical that the clean energy economy not repeat the mistakes of the dirty fossil fuel economy that it is seeking to replace. The pivot from internal combustion engines towards electric vehicles provides an unprecedented opportunity to develop a shared commitment to responsible mineral sourcing. We can accelerate the renewable energy transition and drive improvements in the social and environmental performance of the mining industry by reducing overall demand for new minerals, increasing mineral recycling and reuse, and ensuring that mining only takes place if it meets high environmental, human rights and social standards.

This report is designed to inform downstream battery metal users of key environmental, social, and governance issues associated with the extraction and processing of the three battery metals of principal concern for the development of electric vehicles and low-carbon energy infrastructure—lithium, cobalt and nickel—and to offer guidance on responsible minerals sourcing practices. This report reflects and summarizes some of the key concerns of communities impacted by current and proposed mineral extraction in hotspots around the world: Argentina, Chile and the United States for lithium, Papua New Guinea, Indonesia and Russia for nickel, and the Democratic Republic of Congo for cobalt.

Read the text (PDF).

By Andy Whitmore - War on Want, March 2021

There is an urgent need to deal with the potential widespread destruction and human rights abuses that could be unleashed by the extraction of transition minerals: the materials needed at high volumes for the production of renewable energy technologies. Although it is crucial to tackle the climate crisis, and rapidly transition away from fossil fuels, this transition cannot be achieved by expanding our reliance on other materials. The voices arguing for ‘digging our way out of the climate crisis’, particularly those that make up the global mining industry, are powerful but self-serving and must be rejected. We need carefully planned, lowcarbon and non-resource-intensive solutions for people and planet.

Academics, communities and organisations have labelled this new mining frontier, ‘green extractivism’: the idea that human rights and ecosystems can be sacrificed to mining in the name of “solving” climate change, while at the same time mining companies profit from an unjust, arbitrary and volatile transition. There are multiple environmental, social, governance and human rights concerns associated with this expansion, and threats to communities on the frontlines of conflicts arising from mining for transition minerals are set to increase in the future. However, these threats are happening now. From the deserts of Argentina to the forests of West Papua, impacted communities are resisting the rise of ‘green extractivism’ everywhere it is occurring. They embody the many ways we need to transform our energy-intense societies to ones based on democratic and fair access to the essential elements for a dignified life. We must act in solidarity with impacted communities across the globe.

This report includes in-depth studies written by frontline organisations in Indonesia and Philippines directly resisting nickel mining in both countries respectively. These exclusive case studies highlight the threats, potential impacts and worrying trends associated with nickel mining and illustrate, in detail, the landscape for mining expansion in the region.

Read the text (PDF).