authored by Yvonne Orengo

Transparency International Initiative in Madagascar (TI IMG) has published an open letter signed by 27 local, national and international organisations and associations demanding an independent environmental and human rights impact assessment of Rio Tinto’s QMM mine in Madagascar.

English version of the Open Letter can be downloaded HERE / and with intro from ALT UK HERE

Malagasy version of the Open Letter available HERE

French version available HERE

Investor Briefing on QMM HERE

The sections below this introduction represents a long read. Key points of discussion include:

1. Rio Tinto has refused demands from Malagasy civil society organisations (CSOs)for an independent impact assessment. The hope of CSOs is for an open and inclusive process along similar lines to the Panguna impact assessment , Bougainville. This type of independent assessment has been deemed necessary and requested in different ways, multiple times over numerous years because many issues, especially human rights, social issues, grievance and compensation processes around QMM have not been addressed since the mine began, according to local communities (ROHY 2023).
2. Contestation and concerns over water quality relate to the impacts of the QMM weir on the local lake chemistry (impacts on fish stocks and fisheries since 2007), as well as toxic contaminants (eg elevated uranium, lead, aluminium, cadmium) detected at levels that present health risks to local people and the health of their environment (2019-2021). A breach of a protective environmental zone by QMM in 2014, which placed QMM mine tailings permanently in the local lake, tailings dam failures, the appearance of dead fish and a fishing ban in 2022, have escalated these concerns.
3. Where the company has been conducting water and radiation studies and making assurances, many questions remain. Experts who have reviewed QMM’s annual water report (2021-2023) and its commissioned JBS&G radiation study have demonstrated that the reports’ conclusions are not supported by the data and lack evidence.
4. There have been five conflicts since 2021 over water quality and related issues. In 2023, the shooting of three protestors who were demanding clemency for their leaders (under arrest warrants for organising protests against QMM) has sent a chilling message to those in rural communities next to the mine who have lost trust in QMM over many years and remain dissatisfied with QMM’s response to the challenges they face as a direct result of mine impacts. This includes loss of land, loss of access to natural resources, lost livelihoods and loss of income since the mine started, which for communities who are largely subsistence farmers and fisherfolk and dependent on natural resources and natural waterways, has undermined their food security and survival.
5. The loss of trust and the conflicts locally (since the mine began) are why an independent environmental and human rights impact assessment is so critical to ensure improved communications, inclusivity, governance and transparency, and thereby greater regional stability.

The following content explores these issues in more detail and includes links to studies and articles:

The Ask

The civil society Open Letter and their demand comes just ahead of the Rio Tinto London AGM on 3rd April. It is not the first request the company has received from Malagasy civil society calling for some form of audit and/or external assessment of QMM, some of which can be documented at least as far back as 2019. Almost all have cited social and or environmental impacts of the mine in relation to harm or hardships experienced by the mine affected rural populations.

According to research undertaken by Publish What You Pay Madagascar, PWYP MG, 2022, 94% of such rural community members interviewed reported negative impacts from the mine, largely related to loss of natural resources, livelihoods and water quality. More than 66% believe water quality had deteriorated in the last ten years, and 55% attribute this degradation to pollution from QMM’s mine.

In 2023, Ketakandriana (aka ‘Ke’) Rafitoson, then Director of Transparency International Initiative Madagascar and leading the Publish What You Pay coalition in Madagascar, travelled to the UK to attend the Rio Tinto AGM. She raised human rights issues and asked the Board publicly for independent assessment of QMM. She was also interviewed about the QMM issues and made public calls for the company to be subject to greater transparency and accountability.

Rio Tinto, while making assurances to Ke and the Malagasy people that it is dealing with issues at QMM, has remained intransigent, adamantly denying the demands of its host communities for independent assessments of any kind.

Rio Tinto claims it is doing enough to address the issues that have been raised while at the same time insisting there are no negative impacts of QMM and no health concerns. Aside from an inherent contradiction in this position, there seems to be a loss of memory as to why it might be challenging for stakeholders to trust the company’s verbal assurances and assertions.

Malagasy media cover the Open Letter HERE and HERE

Backtracking

Rio Tinto has had to backtrack on various assertions and concede numerous failings about QMM in recent years. For example, QMM’s breach of an environmental buffer zone . The admission to the breach came in 2019 after two years of the company’s adamant denials and its assurances of QMM’s compliance, despite compelling evidence to the contrary from an independent study using NASA satellite data. The company then claimed there was ‘no significant impact’ from the breach. However, after more inquiry Rio Tinto later had to concede there was no technical study to support this claim.

In 2019, The discovery of QMM’s lack of radiation monitoring in the wider environment exposed more than a decade of unfounded QMM assurances that there was no risk of radiation exposure to local people (mineral sands are rich in radionuclides which are concentrated in the extraction process through churning of the sands). QMM had not been monitoring any ingestion pathways or radiation exposure risks in the wider environment to support its claims.

In 2021 QMM was forced to concede that its ‘natural” or “passive” water management system was not working. QMM’s assurances that its series of settling ponds would sorb all the contaminants from QMM mine process wastewater was shown to be wishful thinking, when independent analysis of QMM’s data clearly demonstrated the system was instead concentrating the contaminants before release into the environment. That water system had already been operating for more than a decade.

QMM has subsequently installed a new treatment plant designed to address the high aluminium and low pH in its mine process wastewater. Whilst QMM assures that the plant is treating this wastewater effectively, it has failed to explain what is in the resulting toxic sludge aside from aluminium hydroxide, which alone poses a serious risk to aquatic life. They have yet to explain how they will manage and store the toxic sludge safely for the long term, especially as QMM has already admitted the Malagasy state has no capacity to manage the toxic waste.

In 2022, Rio Tinto asserted that hundreds of fish deaths in the lake adjacent to the mine were nothing to do with the QMM operation. The fish deaths occurred immediately after QMM released a million cubic metres of its mine basin water into the environment in order to avoid total collapse of its tailings dam (following cyclones and heavy rains). Rio Tinto has withheld the promised report from the WRG study on the fish deaths because the findings were “inconclusive”, claiming local people might misconstrue the results. QMM’s assurances about its impact remain in doubt while probable cause of fish deaths is most likely high aluminium and low pH in QMM mine wastewater.

Access experts’ studies on water, the QMM breach, and radiation HERE

Latest research

The mineral sands being extracted contain not just ilmenite but also monazite and zircon, both of which are rich in radionuclides uranium and thorium. These can be released as a result of the extraction process. Questions over radionuclides such as uranium, and other contaminants such as lead, have persisted since 2019 when Swanson detected elevated uranium 50 times higher than WHO safe drinking water guidance in waterways downstream of QMM where locals fish and gather drinking water.

Since 2023, when QMM published its first ‘Annual Water Report 2021-2023’ alongside its commissioned JBS&G radiation study, the company has confidently used the conclusions from these new reports to assert there is no need of any independent assessments of QMM. They insist QMM is compliant, and assure there are no concerns arising and no risks to health for local people.

In doing so, Rio Tinto/QMM has resolutely chosen to ignore analyses provided by independent radiation and hydrology experts commissioned by The Andrew Lees Trust, which have demonstrated a lack of evidence to support the JBS&G report conclusions on incremental exposure, and data gaps and anomalies that throw into question QMM’s water quality assertions.

Community members disagree with QMM about water quality. The company faces a human rights lawsuit brought by villagers whose blood has been found to contain high levels of lead, claiming that their health has been affected as a direct consequence of QMM water contamination.

Investors in Rio Tinto must decide if they are content to go along with Rio Tinto’s narrative about QMM or whether the time has come to push the industry beyond its self regulated comfort zone, its voluntary commitments and self-reporting, the comfortable top line narratives, and demand a more rigorous scrutiny, robust risk assessments and transparent, independent verification processes.

Beyond water pollution

The impact assessment required is not just about water quality. It is also about human rights, the wider impact of the mine and Rio Tinto/QMM’s environmental, social and governance responsibilities. This is critical since the prevailing power asymmetry created by the presence of the mine has impacted local governance and relationships.

On the social aspect, Ke’s intervention at Rio Tinto’s AGM in 2023 came after a year of local protests in Anosy where the QMM mine operates. Multiple protests manifested after two QMM tailings dam failures, dead fish, a fish ban and months of conflict. However, these were not the first protests around QMM. The region has seen decades of instability around the mine due to QMM’s broken promises and failed social performance – the lack of jobs, lack of alternative livelihoods, lack of adequate compensation for the displaced, for land acquisition, and for lost livelihoods – especially fisherfolk who report some 27 species of fish lost and fish stocks depleted since the QMM weir was built.

If evaluated against the SDGs, QMM’s social programme would find itself with negative ratings on multiple indicators, including but not exclusively :

SDG 1, No Poverty – villagers affected by the mine report a 47% loss of income since the mine began, and Randrianarisoa (2021) reports that 7 out of 10 households (average 6 people per household) are living on less than 150,000 Ar per month, i.e., approximately £25 per month.

SDG 2, Zero Hunger – food security has been seriously undermined for rural people living around the mine due to the loss of land and forest, loss of access to natural resources and degraded water quality upon which they depend for survival.

SDG 16, Peace Justice and Strong Institutions – conflict and grievances, including intra community unrest as well as loss of trust in regulatory bodies and local governance, have grown since the mine started.

SDG 10, Reduced Inequalities : the mine has created a region of have and have nots , those who benefit from the mine and those who do not. Indeed, the whole principle of the SDGs – leave no-one behind – has been truly forgotten around QMM’s operation. The most poor have not just been left behind, they have been marginalised, disenfranchised, vilified and criminalised.

Read the Article “Rio Tinto’s Madagascar mine promised prosperity. It Tainted a community” HERE

The company has admitted that QMM’s community social performance (CSP) failed to meet company standards during a meeting with Malagasy civil society representatives in 2022 . Nevertheless, the company maintains QMM has the credibility and social licence to roll out further social programmes and boasts that under its new lease agreement (renewed in 2023) it will disperse some $4 million dollars per year in Anosy on social projects and regional development.

Without any robust assessment as to why the previous two decades of QMM’s social programme has so spectacularly failed, after millions of dollars already spent, the company risks to waste further resources for no positive, sustainable or equitable outcome.

Since QMM funds its own social programmes it is not subject to the same external evaluations or audits as most development agencies and NGOs. It is not required to deliver and publish reports or its audit its grant dispersals. There is no available disaggregated information about who receives the funds, for what purpose, towards what impact, measured against which indicators, with what theory of change, for which communities, to be delivered when, and all the usual monitoring and evaluation exigencies of the development sector.

There is no transparency over what percentage of the social budget goes to the region/local authorities or how that is used to benefit local people. The latest available information suggests half of the 4 million dollars will go to the region. How the region utilises the funds to benefit local people lacks transparency.

Importantly, there is no inquiry or reporting as to how these budget flows affect local governance and relationships, including the protection of human rights. Information all the more critical in a country suffering from the worst affects of systemic corruption and citizen repression (see more below).

One example of impaired governance is the lack of open public consultation on the monazite extraction at QMM, a subject already raised by a local Deputy with the Minister of Environment in 2019 and which has surfaced again just recently.

Monazite is highly radioactive, especially rich in uranium and thorium. In the mine plan, monazite was considered part of the reject sands and was due to be re-buried at 15m depths back into the excavated landscape. Some information suggests monazite was also stockpiled prior to 2018, the year that QMM started to export the monazite product, which was not long after the question of radionuclides was raised around the QMM buffer breach (2017).

QMM transports the monazite from the Mandena site through the town of Ft Dauphin in trucks and exports the material to China (seems the monazite is too radioactive to ship to Canada with the ilmenite). A public consultation would have been expected. The Deputy and local civil society criticised the ‘fait accompli’ orchestrated by QMM to ensure it could advance these activities with no open, inclusive process. Alongside the lack of proper consultation, there is no transparency as to what specific revenues are being generated by the monazite exports and what percentage is owing to the Malagasy government to benefit its people.

Benefits

The governance around the mine relates directly to who is benefitting from QMM’s presence. The division and differences between those who are gaining from the mine – QMM employees, sub contractors and their staff, the regional actors and services, townsfolk who enjoy electricity, internet connection, the government itself as a 20% owner, not to mention investors and shareholders internationally – and those who are not, specifically rural populations living next to the mine, is stark.

QMM is not a development agency. It is a mining company. Whatever its glossy reports display, its main sustainability interest appears to be ensuring it can keep the dredge running and the trucks moving minerals out of country for processing and profit. Some might argue that it is not Rio Tinto’s place to ensure poverty reduction, which is largely the responsibility of the Malagasy government. However, consider the following :

1. The QMM mine received funding (port construction) from the World Bank in order to be the motor for development and poverty reduction for the southern region of Anosy, the focus of an Integrated Growth Pole programme. Additionally, Rio Tinto promised to lift the region out of poverty and arguably it has brought huge investment. However, the externalities of the project, loss of lands, loss of forests and other natural resources, degraded water quality, resulting in loss of fish stocks, livelihoods and weakened governance, all the unseen costs are carried by the most poor in Anosy. While benefits to rural people are not evident.
2. Promises to local people that the mine would bring jobs, increased employment for locals, has followed the usual pattern around mining. The start up phase saw a boost in employment. However, no locals had been trained or pre-skilled in advance to be ready to take up job opportunities . Only low skilled, low paid and insecure jobs on short term contracts have been available to local people, which has been the cause of resentment and protests. The inevitable trail off of employment post mine start-up has stabilised to levels not dissimilar to what tourism was offering pre-mining more than two decades ago.
3. Community projects and employment have been urgent priorities for the same two decades, especially because of displacement from lands and the lost access to natural resources as a result of the QMM operations. In particular the impact of QMM’s weir construction on local water quality and fisheries since 2007. QMM was expected to annually monitor and compensate for losses in direct relation to the weir impacts, according to QMM environmental commitments (PGEP 2001), but has failed to do so or to generate alternative sustainable livelihoods. Fisherfolk have repeatedly protested against their losses but QMM grievance and compensation processes lack transparency and it remains uncertain to what extent these grievances have been fully resolved.

Dialogue

In the face of many technical, social, environmental and governance challenges and contestations, the company’s ‘dialogue’ has proven to be inadequate, ineffectual and inequitable.

Despite verbal and written assurances of the company’s commitment to dialogue, engagement processes with QMM and Rio Tinto HQ have been the subject of complaint. Riddled with delays, inequitable access to information, revolving personnel, stalled exchanges and deeply concerning exclusionary practices, amongst other problems.

The company decides who can engage, when, and on what terms (theirs). It decides what data is shared and which reports released, irrespective of public promises made or communities’ and investors’ repeat demands for information ( e.g., investors expected and the community were adamant to have the studies reports on the fish deaths in 2022, but never received these to date).

Rio Tinto had also assured its shareholders and concerned civil society that there would be an external investigation into the tailings dam failures of 2022. In the end, two double-sided briefing sheets were issued, produced after some internal evaluation by QMM, and which failed to provide any satisfactory explanation for the tailings dam failures or answer complex risk and safety questions that remain unanswered. There was never any external, independent evaluation/investigation into the dam failures.

Dialogue is invariably “process heavy” as The Australasia Centre for Corporate Responsibility (ACCR) discovered after a recent exchange with Rio Tinto about QMM. The process, such as it is, appears designed to frustrate efforts for resolution, delay actions and exhaust already stretched and under-resourced NGOs/CSOs who advocate for rights and accountability.

It is a process that is unforgivably unnavigable and unendurable.

For example, the Andrew Lees Trust (ALT UK), which has ostensibly been engaged in dialogue on QMM issues with Rio Tinto HQ since 2017 was denied participation in a QMM convened Civil Society Organisations (CSO) Roundtable about QMM’s water updates in March 2024. This roundtable was convened to discuss the QMM 2023 water and JBS&G radiation studies. The meet was a timely because the Trust had just received and was ready to share its experts’ analyses of the studies. Other CSOs attending the meeting were frustrated and angry at ALT UK’s exclusion since they depend upon ALT UK to bring its research and analysis to ensure informed debate on these matters.

The reason for ALT UK’s exclusion was apparently that it already had enough contact / dialogue with the company. So, being in a seven year dialogue with Rio Tinto on the QMM issues was seemingly the very reason ALT UK was denied attendance at an important roundtable meeting on the very subject matter that ALT UK is supposed to be the dialogue with Rio Tinto/QMM about!

Locally, failings in dialogue have resulted in serious conflict. In 2023 QMM refused to meet and engage in direct dialogue with leaders of a local association representing some 15,000 local people (LuSud), which had submitted a demand to the Government and to QMM asking for mine operations to be suspended until multiple social and environmental issues were resolved, including outstanding compensation issues.

At least three national and international agencies urged Rio Tinto/QMM to engage in direct dialogue with the association. QMM’s stubborn refusal to meet with them was followed by protests and road blocks in June/July 2023. State security was deployed and protestors were beaten, arrested, and imprisoned, including one seven month pregnant woman.

QMM’s approach failed to produce meaningful resolution to the local issues and conflict. Instead, the conflict escalated into violence in October 2023 with the extrajudicial killings of three protestors. The protestors were demanding clemency for their association leaders who remain under arrest warrants for organising the June /July 2023 protests against QMM. There is still no inquiry into these killings and the company fails to recognise more than one of the protestor deaths – with no explanation as to why.

The shootings, arrests, incarcerations, fines and beatings of protestors, the lack of engaged dialogue and robust grievance and resolution processes, means that while QMM may have silenced and cowed an impoverished rural population around its mine site, all the time colluding with an administration that is actively repressing civil society with arbitrary detentions, it continues to fail on Corporate Human Rights Benchmarks , its commitments under UN Guiding Principles, and its claim of “community first”.

There is irony in the fact that an external platform (ROHY), which QMM insisted LuSud should attend (in place of a direct dialogue with QMM) convened with local people and concluded in its 2023 report that the socio-economic conditions of the surrounding communities of QMM, was “not yet tangible. Added to this are other issues that have been unresolved since QMM was set up“. These were the very complaints of LuSud, even though they did not attend so did not directly voice them at the platform.It does nevertheless suggest that LuSud’s demands were reflective of wider community concerns.

ROHY’s report highlighted “The urgent need to find sustainable solutions to the issue of water/water quality, which is the main cause of grievances, causing health problems and having a negative impact on fishing activities according to local communities”. They concluded that ” Strategic Environmental and Social Assessment (SESA) must be adopted as a working method to make (mining) investments justifiable“.

Assessments of any kind remain off the table at Rio Tinto for QMM. No matter who asks for them.

Those rural communities in Anosy who hold little hope their rights will be protected by their own government, await a door through which those who hold the power over their future can be pulled into the light – to be more transparently examined and, where necessary, held accountable to repair and remedy any harms or hardships for which they are responsible.

RIO TINTO AGM LONDON 2025 – RECORDING IS HERE (intervention by Valery Ramaherison of TI IMG asking about the assessment on QMM – at 1.37.25- 1.55.52 ) https://lumiagmukstreams.s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/6.+Archive+2025/RioTinto/RioTinto+AGM+2025+(1080p).mp4

Investor alert: MIND THE GAP! Rio Tinto versus Reality

In Memoriam

On the 31^st December 2024, The Andrew Lees Trust marked the thirtieth anniversary of Andrew Lees death in Madagascar.  Andrew gave his life while seeking to protect the endangered forests and unique biodiversity of southeast Madagascar and his sacrifice and inspiration remain an enduring legacy.

Andrew’s spirit has accompanied us on the paths we have trodden. Andrew believed in speaking truth to power. He passionately defended the natural world, and he encouraged people to find and advance their own solutions to environmental, social or personal development. His scientific rigour, his integrity and tireless tenacity in seeking to expose the truth, protect the environment and champion the voiceless has echoed through our endeavours. So too has his passion for working with local people. His family, friends and colleagues are interwoven into the story of the Trust, and those who have come to work with us have embraced the atmosphere of extended ‘family’.

A traditional Malagasy stone marks the place where Andrew fell in Petriky, southern Madagascar, while filming its endangered forests. It is designated a sacred site by the villagers, protected under their traditional laws. Some six thousand miles away in the UK, a local government plaque marks his tenacious and inspiring work to protect the Halvergate Marshes in Norfolk, his birthplace. But wherever Andrew is remembered there is no sense of distance, just a whisper in the grass and the fluttering of butterfly wings.

“At some point I had to stand up and be counted. Who will speak for the butterflies?” Andrew Lees

Some key campaigns of Andrew Lees

In 1980 Andrew campaigned with FOE to prevent Crymlyn Bog in Swansea being used as a landfill site.
It was designated an SSSI and then became an internationally protected Ramsar Site in 1993. a plaque in Wales marks his successful work to protect Crymlyn Bog.

In 1982 Andrew campaigned with Friends of the Earth to save Halvergate Marshes, which became an Environmentally Sensitive Area (ESA). His work contributed to the establishment of the Broads Authority in 1988.

In 1985 Andrew became Friends of the Earth’s Pollution and Toxics Campaigner and successfully campaigned for the abandonment of the “Dirty Dozen’, which included the most notorious pesticides at the time.

In 1988, Andrew exposed the dumping of toxic waste in Nigeria from Karin B, and successfully lobbied the UK to support an OECD policy that countries be responsible for their own waste.

In 1990 Andrew was made Campaigns Director of FOE.

Andrew died in 1994 in Madagascar whilst researching at that time a proposed, potentially harmful ilmenite mining project by mining giant Rio Tinto.

In 2013 Andrew was ranked 43rd in the UK Environment Agency’s all-time list of scientists, campaigners, and naturalists who have done the most to save the planet

Download the infosheet Here

Andrew in Madagascar 1994

Andrew went to Madagascar in December 1994 to research a mineral sands project proposed by the mining giant Rio Tinto. The ongoing extraction of ilmenite from these sands is projected to denude the south-eastern coastline of 6,000 hectares of littoral forest and its unique biodiversity, while also impacting thousands of villagers who depend on natural resources and these forests for their survival.

Andrew died on New Year’s Eve while filming in the forest of Petriky, one of the extraction sites just south of the Antanosy capital, Taolagnaro (also known as Ft Dauphin). A committed botanist and environmental campaigner of international renown, Andrew was researching the region to understand what locals knew of the proposed mine and was capturing their voices and images of the local environment to bring the potential issues to light.

Launch of the Andrew Lees Trust

Andrew was missing in the forest for almost a week before his body was found and eventually repatriated. After his death, colleagues at Friends of the Earth, the Lees family and Andrew’s partner Christine Orengo met to agree that the thousands of pounds donated to Friends of the Earth to help the search for Andrew be used to help set up an environmental educational centre in the region, the Centre Ecologique Libanona (CEL), which would provide higher education courses for Malagasy students.

In 1998 the Trust began its own social and environmental education programmes in the field in southern Madagascar, working with communities to address their needs for communications, access to non-formal education, improved food security and natural resource management. Over the following decade, the Trust’s field programme grew to encompass eight regions of southern Madagascar, reaching more than a million people across all its programmatic themes, and providing employment and professional development for 60 Malagasy staff.

Read about the Trust’s field programmes HERE

The Trust realised its strategy to support and develop the capabilities of local people, strengthening their capacity to lead and advance locally developed initiatives for social and environmental transformation. This was embodied in the hand over of all its assets and know how to its local Malagasy team in 2009 and the launch of the sovereign Malagasy NGO, Andry Lalana Tohana (ALT MG).

Responsible Exit

The Trust handed over to its local team in a responsible exit in 2009. The strategic preparations for hand over and sustainable management of core field programmes, including the radio project (Communications for Development) and the sorghum reintroduction programme (food security), were realised over a three year period and assisted the team to finally set up and launch their own Malagasy NGO. The Trust accompanied Andry Lalana Tohana (ALT MG) for a number of years, especially supporting the fledgling organisation during the years of political crisis 2009-2014 that immediately followed the handover and saw the collapse of national funding envelopes in Madagascar. The Trust has since maintained a policy of responsive assistance to ALT MG, for example for technical advice, fundraising and equipment.

Read about ALT MG HERE

In 2024, ALT MG celebrated 15 years of a successful track record and is an acknowledged leader in the famine relief effort in the deep south of the island, working with multiple national and international donors and partners in the affected communities. It is also a UN recognised provider of Communications for Development (C4D) in the south. 

Research and Advocacy

A further area of the Trust’s work has been to amplify the voice and advocate the human rights of local communities affected by the large-scale mining.

The Rio Tinto QMM mining project that Andrew researched was approved and finally started extraction in 2009. The QMM mine has brought some notable changes to the region but for the overwhelming majority of the rural communities living directly adjacent to the mine, these have not been positive.

Some 94% of the rural affected communities living around the mine reported only negative impacts of the mine in a 2022 study by Publish What You Pay Madagascar. As well as loss of lands and forest, water quality has been affected and livelihoods impacted with serious loss of revenues since the arrival of the mine, especially due to the negative impact of the mine on fish stocks and other water products (mahampy reeds) essential for survival and livelihoods.

The Trust has monitored the effects of the mine’s advance on local communities and civil society, including groundbreaking participatory communications such as the Oral Testimonies (published by PANOS London in 2009), which lead to a legal class action against the mining company around failed compensation for displaced people.

Read about the research and advocacy work HERE

Andrew foresaw the challenges local people would face to protect their natural environment and traditional lifestyles around the mining operation. Throughout his career, he championed the use of both scientific research and law in environmental protection.

The Trust has undertaken substantive research from 2016 following the mine’s breach of an environmental buffer zone designated to protect local waterways. The breach led to concerns about water contamination from uranium, lead and other heavy metals, which are concentrated during the mine’s extraction process and are present in mine process water that is discharged into the local environment.

Read more about the mine and local communities HERE

The research has involved significant inputs and analysis from international scientific experts in radioactivity and hydrology as well as close collaboration and exchange with Malagasy civil society locally, nationally, and in the Diaspora. The advocacy has resulted in some technical changes, new investments into the mine, and greater financial commitments to the social programme for local communities. The issues are ongoing.

This research has also been instrumental in aiding the launch of another legal case against Rio Tinto by the UK human rights law firm Leigh Day, which is pursuing damages for local people with regard to concerning levels of lead in their blood, which local people claim is attributable to the mine’s contamination of their natural drinking water sources.

Read about the legal case HERE

The Trust endeavours through its research and advocacy work and its partnership with Malagasy civil society, to honour Andrew’s legacy and promote human rights, transparency and accountability for mine-affected communities in southern Madagascar. Its approach is grounded in decades of experience of working within the southern context, and understanding and appreciating its particular social, cultural and environmental character, strengths and challenges.

Andrew Lees Trust’s Director attended the Rio Tinto AGM in London, in person on 4^th April and online for the Australia AGM on the 2^nd May. The aim was to bring questions to the Board and increase transparency and accountability around the impact of the QMM mine’s contamination of local waterways in S Madagascar.

Opening her address to the Board at the London AGM, the Director of the Andrew Lees Trust (ALT UK) took a moment to mark the deaths of three Antanosy citizens who were shot down in what appear to be extrajudicial killings by state police in October 2023. The citizens were demonstrating about arrest warrants still hanging over community leaders who organised protests against QMM in the previous June. There has been repeat conflict around QMM in the last few years.

The AGM questions she brought to the Board of Rio Tinto concerned QMM water contamination. In particular the question of why the company had done nothing to address elevated levels of uranium and lead downstream of the mine, which have been brought to the attention of Rio Tinto since 2019 (Swanson 2019; Emerman 2019) and were now the subject of a legal action. This legal action was announced via an article in The Guardian newspaper on the day of the AGM, she explained.

The Guardian article can be accessed HERE

The Guardian piece, which was an excerpt from an original article in The Intercept published on the 3rd April, brought to light that UK human rights law firm, Leigh Day, are now acting for villagers affected by the QMM mine.

The Intercept article can be accessed HERE

The ALT UK Director went on to explain that the Leigh Day announced that test results from a cohort of villagers living downstream of the mine revealed elevated Blood Lead Levels (BLL) of concern, beyond WHO thresholds, therefore requiring medical attention. Lead toxicity can be especially harmful to children’s development and can cause brain damage. The affected community members are bringing the law suit against the company for damages to their health and environment and to ensure the necessary medical and remedial actions can be taken.

The BLL findings confirm the need to investigate in more depth QMM’s impact on the environment and the health of some 15,000 local people living around the mine, the majority of whom are dependent on natural water sources for drinking and domestic water, also for food, fishing and livelihoods. Communities have been complaining about water quality and QMM impact over many years (Timeline of events at QMM here)

The ALT UK Director said that recent reports published by Rio Tinto from JBS&G 2023 and QMM 2023, on radioactivity and water respectively, continue to claim there is no impact from the mine.  However, recent analyses of these studies /reports from expert hydrologist Dr Emerman and radioactivity specialist Dr Swanson, challenge and contradict this narrative.

Summary points were shared at the AGM, highlighting the problems arising from unsupported conclusions in the JBS&G study through to data management issues in the QMM 2023 water report.

Expert analyses on QMM reporting can be accessed HERE

One important factor in water analysis has been the introduction of pre-mining data into Dr Emerman’s analysis of QMM’s water reporting. This data took four years to access from QMM. It provides important readings of uranium and lead pre-mining and, using all available water data, demonstrates the increase in uranium concentration by a factor of 884 from before to after opening the mine was statistically significant at the 99.999999999% confidence level. As yet, QMM have not incorporated or applied its own baseline water data to measure the comparison of pre to post mining water quality.

Given all the concerns, the Board were asked to explain why Rio Tinto persists in refusing Malagasy civil society requests for independent audits – specifically an independent water impact assessment as previously requested at last year’s AGM.

Investors have also been asking the company to commit to independent water impact assessments, as Reuters reported earlier this year. The Local Authorities Pension Fund Forum (LAPFF) raised the question of independent water impact assessments again at this year’s AGM.

A full recording if the AGM can he accessed HERE   (Questions raised on QMM and the response can be heard at 1.16.53 –and closing comment 2.16.24)

Rio Tinto did not answer the questions raised by ALT UK at the AGM about the need for independent water impact assessment at QMM. Instead, they quoted the latest QMM water report 2023, stating there were no uranium and lead levels of note.  They typically ignored the data problems raised about the QMM report and the JBS&G study.

In the first part of his response, the Chair of the Rio Tinto Board claimed that the death of three protestor in October 2023 were related to conflict around elections. This was not the case. The deaths, that appear to be extrajudicial killings by state police, took place when a local association’s members gathered on private ground adjacent to the road that goes to the mine. They were protesting that their two leaders were still under arrest warrants for organising protests against QMM in June 2023. Despite verbal promises of clemency, no official release from the warrants had been forthcoming.

There has been no inquiry about the killings, and no closure for bereaved families.  QMM has security arrangements with local police and army, and the Chair’s framing of the protests highlights how QMM protests have been increasingly politicised by the state and by the company.

Access more information about the conflict around QMM HERE

The Chair of the Board said the company cared deeply about the water quality and what was happening at QMM and encouraged “viewpoints from different groups”. However, ALT UK was deliberately excluded and refused attendance at a stakeholder meeting organised by Rio Tinto in March this year about QMM water quality. A number of the NGOs who attended commented upon and criticised the exclusion, cognisant that ALT UK brings research and expert analysis, which contributes vital information to these discussions.

The Chair invited the CEO of Minerals to comment on water issues. She explained that new QMM water report 2021-2023 had been simplified according to requests from local people. It is not clear who has made these requests and they do not reflect requests from Malagasy civil society e.g., PWYP MG and internationals e.g., ALT UK who have repeatedly asked the company to ensure raw data sets be included in any QMM water reporting to ensure open access – specifically for independent analysis of the raw data. The company did not do this.

It took three months after the report was issued to obtain the raw data sets. These appeared to represent different data (the raw data numbers) to that which was presented graphically (as a visual) in the QMM report. The problem of the two sets of QMM water data for 2021-2023 that do not match each other, without any clarity on which is the correct set of data, was ignored and not addressed by Rio Tinto in their response.

The company also did not mention that the QMM 2021-2023 water report only looks at a subset of water data (21 months) and does not include previous data, nor the pre-mining (baseline) data and so is not representative of the overall water quality situation. The detrimental impact of the mine continues to be indicated when using all available data.

The CEO of Minerals also explained that withholding the WRG report on fish deaths of 2022, following two dam failings and the release of a million cubic metres of mine basin water, was because the results were “inconclusive”. The company has also stated that they are concerned that local people will misinterpret the results. Neither of these are valid or acceptable reasons to withhold a promised report and data.

The company has repeatedly claimed QMM was not responsible for the fish deaths in 2022. So, it seems that when the WRG study results do not support QMM’s position conclusively, the report is then deliberately withheld – an action which raises profound questions and concerns. The WRG report and data, which was requested and promised to civil society and investors alike for almost two years, must be shared. It should be included in and contribute to the wider body of available data and knowledge about the QMM mine impacts.

The AGM was covered by Reuters who mention the Madagascar water issues, see HERE

Water was a theme carried through multiple questions and interventions at the AGM by representatives from Serbia, Mongolia, Arizona, and Guinea. Together with Madagascar and Bougainville, water issues have been identified and collectively published in a six country Briefing about Rio Tinto mines in these countries, all of which face issues with water contamination, water access and or mine tailings management.

See LMN’s report of the London 2024 AGM coverage HERE

London Mining Network (LMN) convened various group activities and meetings around the AGM this year and amplified the call for attention on water issues and the need for independent water impact assessments for existing and proposed mines. As the energy transition demands exponential mineral extraction, and the mining industry uses vast quantities of water, frequently discharging contaminants in its wake, the question of rights of use, access and management of water quality is a globally significant and pressing issue.

At the Australia AGM, the Chair of the Board emphasised that Rio Tinto published its water data and was one of the first companies to do so. However, this reporting has concerned water usage and not water quality. As shown above (in the six country briefing) multiple countries that host Rio Tinto mines are experiencing problems with water contamination issues, or threats of similar for proposed mines, and lack of transparency over water and related mine tailings management.

On May 2^nd Rio Tinto’s Australia AGM was held in Brisbane. Thanks to the Australasia Centre for Corporate Accountability, the Director of ALT UK was able to attend by proxy via an online link.

At this second AGM, in answer to ALT UK’s questions about QMM water contamination, the Blood Lead Levels from testing and the launch of a legal case, the Chair of the Board reiterated the care Rio Tinto has about the water quality and then asked the CEO of Minerals to comment. She listed all the studies that Rio Tinto have commissioned and produced about QMM. In this regard the company response was not substantially different to what had been said in London, and equally bypassed the critiques of the recent QMM studies that new experts’ analyses have provided ( see above).

Once again, the company used its own studies to claim transparency and ignored the calls for an independent water impact assessment that Malagasy civil society, with support from ALT UK, have been demanding.

The Board of Rio Tinto completely ignored the question and request for audits of QMM human rights policies and practices and its grievance and compensation procedures, all of which have been the subject of multiple complaints.

The Australia AGM can be heard in full HERE and the questions on QMM can be heard at 57.16 in the recording

In the response, the CEO of Minerals mentioned the Trust’s intervention at the 2017 Rio Tinto AGM and suggested the company then started investigating radiological issues. That is not the case. In fact it was the Trust that commissioned an independent radioactivity study at that time and the ensuing report by Swanson (2019) published the finding of elevated uranium downstream of QMM, 50 times higher than WHO safe drinking water guidelines (using QMM water data). As the majority of communities living around the mine draw their drinking water from lakes and rivers downstream of the mine this finding was of particular concern.

The company’s initial response to the finding by Swanson was to ask the Trust to remove the high uranium finding from the Swanson report. ALT UK declined. The Swanson study also highlighted that QMM had inadequate monitoring of the wider environment around QMM, in particular to understand the mine’s impact and contribution to incremental radiation exposure, and QMM been not been carrying out any monitoring of ingestion pathways around the QMM mine. The company then commissioned the 2019 JBS&G study, which was finally published at the end of last year.

Swanson’s recent analysis of the JBS&G 2023 report, while commending improvements in radioactivity monitoring at QMM brought about by JBS&G, has concluded that “The level of confidence in the conclusions presented in the (JBS&G) report cannot be determined quantitatively because of limitations of the study design.” Guidance for Data Quality Objectives was not consistently nor completely followed. The data do not support the primary argument in the JBS&G report regarding incremental contribution of the mine to radiation dose (P3 Swanson, 2024). In other words the company’s claims that there is no radiological impact and no health impact cannot be supported.

ALT UK’s Briefing on QMM 2024 can be found HERE

The Australia AGM provided an opportunity to alert investors in Australia to issues at the QMM mine that they may not otherwise hear about. ALT UK’s questions informed those present about the legal case by Leigh Day, the testing and identification of elevated Blood Lead Levels in villagers living downstream of the QMM mine, and they were pointed to where they could access expert analysis of the current studies produced by QMM, which challenge and contradict the claims being made by the company.

Protracted dialogue on QMM since 2017

There are too many questions arising around QMM operations to raise at any single AGM. The company is failing in its dialogue and not addressing all the issues raised, especially around detailed technical questions. For example, after two years from pilot to expansion of its new water treatment plant, QMM cannot explicitly state all the contaminants that are in or how it will manage the toxic waste product from the process. The toxic waste is being stored in “geotextile bags” on site but the company admits there is no capacity for Madagascar to handle this waste product.

Most recently Rio Tinto has started the practice of directing ALT UK and its questions towards a third-party platform that does not yet exist, and in which ALT UK has not agreed to participate.

ALT UK has been in direct dialogue with Rio Tinto since 2017 when it raised the QMM breach of an environmental buffer zone at the company 2017 AGM and concomitant questions about water contamination. ALT UK has worked closely with community representatives and Malagasy civil society actors, especially Publish What You Pay Madagascar (PWYP MG) with whom it collaborates closely on research and advocacy actions, to help amplify communities’ rights. Specifically to protect their and future generations’ right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment.

ALT UK continues to support the call for independent water impact assessments at QMM. This type of process is currently already underway at the Panguna mine in Bougainvile where Rio Tinto left a 35 year toxic legacy.

Read more about the Trust’s advocacy and research work about the QMM mine HERE

Endnote: One share in Rio Tinto (held since 1995, after Andrew Lees died, allows the Director of ALT UK to attend the company AGM, question the company and use the opportunity to promote greater accountability around the QMM operation. For many years ALT UK has attended the AGM in order to promote transparency about QMM’s impacts on the local communities and to amplify their human rights. The small dividend from the one share has never been cashed.

Following the public release of the QMM Water Report 2021-2023 and the 2023 JBS&G radiation report, the Andrew Lees Trust (ALT UK) requested independent hydrology and radioactivity experts to review the studies and their findings.

The experts’ analyses have now been published by ALT UK and show that ongoing vigilance and caution are necessary with regard to water quality and radiation exposure – especially for the most vulnerable groups, around Rio Tinto’s QMM mineral sands operation in southern Madagascar.

The independent hydrology and radioactivity experts’ analyses are now available on the ALT UK website HERE

Nothing in the 2023 QMM or JBS&G reports have been found to confirm or assure that the mining company yet has the QMM contamination and water quality management issues under control, or support its claims. This is signified, in part, through data quality problems and study limitations that are explained, in summary, in our latest March 2024 Briefing, together with ongoing transparency challenges (eg Rio Tinto/QMM’s withholding of relevant studies).

Analysis of all the data confirmed “the detrimental impact of the QMM mine on regional water quality” (Emerman 2024).

See the March 2024 Briefing on QMM ENGLISH VERSION here

“The level of confidence in the conclusions presented in the (JBS&G radiation study) report cannot be determined quantitatively because of limitations of the study design” (Swanson 2024).

VERSION FRANÇAISE de Briefing disponible ici

Water quality around QMM has been a concern for local communities for many years, including in relation to livelihood losses and health, and consequently at the root of multiple protests and conflict in the region. The conflicts have given rise to wider human rights violations and concerns around the Rio Tinto/QMM mine.

ALT UK with Publish What You Pay Madagascar continue to press Rio Tinto, the parent company of QMM, for an independent water impact assessment that could offer a neutral and inclusive process (for communities and stakeholders) and provide the basis for improved transparency around QMM water quality, help build informed consensus, resolve and remediate issues, and thereby promote greater stability in the region.

The Trust is also collaborating with other civil society actors who are raising issues about water quality and water governance around Rio Tinto mines in other locations, both for proposed, existing and legacy mine sites. They are all, alongside the company’s investors, pressing Rio Tinto for a commitment to independent water impact assessments and for appropriate remedial actions identified through such processes.

A recent article about Rio Tinto’s aluminium facilities in Canada exposes a whistleblower’s insights about the company’s alarming behaviour in relation to water management, and highlights the need for increased transparency and governance around water at Rio Tinto operations around the world – and around all mining operations globally. Water is life!

This research forms part of the Trust’s ongoing advocacy work in solidarity with Malagasy civil society and local communities in Madagascar.

Protestors raising issues about the QMM mine in June 2023 were met with armed police and military force. 127 protestors were arrested and 87 reportedly incarcerated, including women. One of the women was seven months pregnant.

Subsequently, in October 2023, while protesting against the status of their local association leaders who had been charged with ‘undermining state security’ for the June protest, three local protestors were shot dead by state police. One was a 45 year old female domestic worker. There was an almost total media blackout of these events, and there has been no public inquiry into what appears to have been extrajudicial killings of protestors.

The Business and Human Rights Resource Centre (BHRRC) has raised questions about the conflicts with Rio Tinto.  The BHRRC has now concluded the exchange with Rio Tinto on these matters and has published articles, responses from Rio Tinto, and the rejoinders from Publish What You Pay Madagascar (PWYP MG) and Andrew Lees Trust (ALT UK).

See all correspondence and Rejoinders  here on the BHRRC website.

In June military were brought into Anosy from across the island to suppress the protests. https://fb.watch/qJdBpikv3g/

The following cases have been added to the BHRRC database on attacks against human rights defenders:

75 protesters

Ms Rasolonirina – LUSUD Association

Mr Damy – LUSUD Association

Mr Andriamamonjy Jean Salomon – LUSUD Association

Eugène Chretien – LUSUD association

6 protesters

5 trade unionists – Syndicalisme et Vie des Societes (SVS) Anosy and Sendika Kristanina Malagasy (SEKRIMA)

Laurent Manjary – LUSUD association

The local association LuSud that organised the local protests has not published its own account of the conflicts from locally gathered testimonies. With its leaders still in hiding under arrest warrants, and the criminalisation of protestors in general, it is unclear who can or will want to take responsibility for issuing any formal statements for the local association.

The Malagasy diaspora organisation Collectif TANY has issued various statements about the conflict and continues to seek justice for local people affected by these events.

https://www.terresmalgaches.info/newsletter/article/newsletter-no195-des-mandats-d-arr%C8%87t-lances-contre-deux-responsables-de-l?recherche=QMM

translation available here: –

https://londonminingnetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/COMMUNIQUEE-COLLECTIF-TANY-2-JULY-2023-.pdf

In September 2023, civil society actors, with the support of Eko, brought a petition of over 77,000 signatures to the offices of Rio Tinto demanding greater transparency on water quality and tailings management.

See details n The Ecologist article here

The Ekō petition follows two tailings dam failures at the QMM mine in 2022 with ensuing fish deaths, a fishing ban, and months of conflict.

The lack of a promised independent investigation into the tailings dam failures compounded existing needs for an external investigation into water management at QMM, in particular regarding the QMM tailings dam safety, and QMM’s management of their tailings and mine process wastewater.

There have been four tailings dam failures since the QMM mine operations began and two have resulted in publicly reported fish deaths.

The company promised an external investigation into the dam failures in 2022. However, in 2023 it was revealed that QMM had only undertaken an internal inquiry with external assistance.

The shared QMM briefing papers 1 and 2 were wholly inadequate at explaining the root cause of the dam failures.

The company also promised an external study into the cause of the 2022 fish deaths – events that QMM has repeatedly claimed had nothing to do with the release of a million cubic metres of QMM mine basin water or the tailings dam failures.

As of February 2024 they have still not released the report of the fish deaths study, despite repeated requests. This withholding of information undermines the company’s commitment to transparency, UN Guiding Principles on Human Rights, and the promises they made directly to both civil society and investors.

Investors are pressing Rio Tinto for the Independent water impact assessments, with urgent priority at the company’s Mongolia and Madagascar ( QMM) mine sites. See here

The Ekō petition echoes the demand for independent audits of QMM made at the AGM in 2023 by Andrew Lees Trust (ALT UK) and Publish What You Pay Madagascar (PWYP MG).

The Andrew Lees Trust and Publish What You Pay Madagascar have been pressing the company to resolve multiple issues with QMM over the last seven years including:  water contamination from elevated uranium and lead and human rights violations around compensation processes.

Rio Tinto has declined multiple requests to accept an independent audit or impact assessment at QMM. Civil society continues to demand them.

Raising awareness, amplifying the voice of local communities and promoting human rights around the QMM mine in Madagascar

This year’s AGM of the multinational mining giant Rio Tinto marked 150 years of the company’s global operations. As in previous years, the event afforded an opportunity to put questions to the Board and advocate for greater transparency and accountability about the company’s QMM mining operation in southern Madagascar.

Civil society representative Ketakandriana Rafitoson (know as ‘Ke’ – pronounced ‘Kay’), Executive Director of Transparency International Initiative Madagascar, which coordinates the Publish What you Pay (PWYP MG) coalition in Madagascar was supported by London Mining Network to visit London to attend the Rio Tinto AGM, accompanied by, the Director of Andrew Lees Trust (ALT UK), Yvonne Orengo.

Working together, and with community representatives, researchers and other campaigners, the PWYP MG and ALT UK advocacy campaign has brought attention to social and environmental problems around the QMM mine site. The most recent challenges that would be brought to the Rio Tinto 2023 AGM were highlighted in an article in the Ecologist in April:-

Read the Ecologist article, HERE

Questions raised at this year’s AGM focused first on human rights violations that have been reported from the ground during a recent compensation process by QMM. In particular, that gagging orders had been placed on local people during the the QMM negotiations, in direct breach of commitments Rio Tinto made after the Juukan Gorge inquiry to cease such gag clauses on traditional owners.

The QMM process was meant to address losses from the hardships and conflict created during a three-month fishing ban in 2022, after hundreds of dead fish appeared following two tailings dam failures and the release of a million cubic metres of mine waste water. Also, to remedy the negative impact of the mine on local livelihoods for more than a decade.

Further questions brought pressure on the company about the ongoing water quality issues and dam safety, central to community and environmental concerns around the QMM operations.

A Briefing paper was circulated to investors to summarise the key points, weeks before the AGM:

Download the Investor Briefing on QMM Madagascar HERE

The key demands of PWYP MG /ALT UK to Rio Tinto at the 2023 AGM: independent audits must be undertaken of the QMM compensation programme, water quality and dam safety.

Hear the questions and answers in the AGM recording: HERE reference points to the Q& A in the recording are : (1) PWYP MG question at 1.12.01 – 1.20.30 ( including response from Rio Tinto and follow up question) then (2) ALT UK question at 2.05.48 to 2.15.05 (including response)

Questions were also raised at the AGM about the competence levels at QMM by the Jesuit Missions ( See recording at 1.50.14), and also by the Local Authorities Pension Fund Forum (recording at 1.39.55) referring to the gagging clauses mentioned above.

The issues and demands from PWYP MG and ALT UK were taken to the Rio Tinto AGM in Australia a month later on May 4^th (called in online), again pressuring the company to agree to independent audits.

Listen to the recording of the Rio Tinto Australia AGM : HERE with ALT UK Q&A at 54.36 – 57.08 including response

The company is declining to agree to independent audits while insisting its own internal processes are adequate.

At both the April (London) and May (Australia) AGMs, the new Chair of the Board, Dominic Barton, responded to the questions and made assurances that the company took the concerns about QMM seriously. He publicly asserted that when he joined the Board and heard the AGM questions about QMM last year, he prioritised to go and see the QMM mine in person and had met with communities in Anosy.

Rio Tinto’s response to PWYP MG/ALT UK Investor briefing: – See link on their QMM website page HERE

In London, Mr Barton asked the CEO of Minerals, Sinead Kaufman, to respond to the questions in detail. Ms Kaufman also met with PWYP MG and ALT UK the morning of the London AGM and expressed the position that the company wanted to conduct its own internal review of the compensation process at QMM before agreeing to any independent audit.

In Australia, Mr Barton mentioned that Rio Tinto had now created a written response to the issues raised (see link above). On the water issues, he explained that the company had “different views” about the water quality and ‘different data” but was committed to sharing data and to discussing the differences.

Hear the full Q&A using the London AGM and to the Australia AGM, and read the company’s written response using the links above.

A week of actions….

During the week before and for some days after the London AGM, Ke’s visit to the UK afforded opportunities to meet with a number of investors and other organisations including the Church of England Pensions Board who, with UNEP, launched the Global Tailings Management Institute in January 2023. This afforded an opportunity to present the human rights issues around QMM’s compensation process and follow up on questions raised by ALT UK at the Global Tailings Summit about QMM mine tailings management.

Meetings were also held with the Publish What You Pay Secretariat based in London; Jesuit Missions, and the UK All-Party Parliamentary Group on Human Rights.

Other events organised by London Mining Network took place with activists from Serbia and Arizona including a presentation at Amnesty International and a ‘mock trial’ outside the offices of Rio Tinto in London.

See the presentation at Amnesty HERE

See Ke at the Mock Trial HERE

An interview took place with the Director for International Development at the Laudato Si Institute where Ke explained how her work sits within her beliefs as a practising catholic and the work of Jesuits advocacy project: Justice in Mining.

Read the interview with Ke HERE

Ke also engaged with media while in London and provided her thoughts about the QMM operation to the online magazine Mongabay, asking the question “what is QMM is willing to do in order to repair what they have destroyed?”

Read the article by Ke published by Mongabay in May 2023 : HERE

We were very sad that Malagasy community representative Tahiry Ratsiambohatra, who was also meant to join the campaign in the AGM week, was unable to travel to London due to illness. Together with PWYP MG and ALT UK, Tahiry met with Rio Tinto executive in July 2022 and this was an opportunity for him to follow up on issues raised then and for new questions to be aired. Tahiry actively contributed to discussions and preparations for the activities in London with LMN and was missed.

London Mining Network (LMN) actions see here: https://londonminingnetwork.org/rio-tinto-people-climate-nature/

Huge thanks to London Mining Network and their team for all their work – and the photos above – and to all the helpers and participants at the London actions, as well as fellow activists and campaigners from Arizona and Serbia!

Executive Director of Transparency International Initiative Madagascar (TI-MG), Ketakandriana Rafitoson (Ke), who also leads the Publish What You Pay coalition in Madagascar (PWYP MG), was in London this past week to attend the 2023 Rio Tinto AGM.

Ke – along with TI-MG and PWYP MG teams – has been working in close collaboration with the Andrew Lees Trust (ALT UK) and with the generous support of London Mining Network (LMN) in order to bring community issues directly to the company’s Board of Directors, investors and shareholders in London.

The AGM event, and multiple meetings around it, have provided the opportunity to raise questions and concerns about human rights violations caused by the Rio Tinto mine in Madagascar, and with a specific focus on the transparency and accountability of the compensation process that has recently delivered to address livelihood losses experienced by local communities affected by the mining giant’s subsidiary, Qit Minerals Madagascar (QMM).

Read the article here

It is just over year since two mine tailings dam failures at Rio Tinto’s QMM mine brought local fisherfolks’ lives to a halt when the appearance of hundreds of dead fish in downstream lakes precipitated a fishing ban.

Villagers were plunged into food insecurity and hardship, and the events led to months of conflict.

When resolution was finally brokered, in May 2022, it was agreed that QMM must compensate not just for losses caused by the fishing ban, but also for up to thirteen years of reported losses as a result of mining related activity at QMM.

A total of 8778 villagers submitted claims against QMM. The compensation process began in September 2022.

Months later, reports emerged that a number of human rights violations had occurred around QMM’s compensation to villagers, in particular that there had been intimidation and coercion at the start of the process, and an unexplained illegal detention of villagers at a local police station when they had gone to join negotiations.

See background information here

ALT UK and PWYP MG have been writing to Rio Tinto since last November, questioning the compensation process and raising multiple concerns about human rights violations.

In February 2023, the company finally responded to inquiries sent in a joint letter from PWYP MG and ALT UK in December 2022. The company asserted that the presence of a notary and mediator had ensured the QMM compensation process was acceptable to villagers.

However, an increased number of human rights violations were reported as the process advanced, and another letter outlining these was submitted to the company in March 2023

See additional letter to Rio Tinto March 2023 here

Based on current reports from the field PWYP MG and ALT UK, are demanding an independent audit of the QMM compensation process. Also for the tailings dam failures and water quality that are the central problems to villagers loss of livelihoods and reports of health impacts from the QMM mine.

Rio Tinto’s Board faced questions from Madagascar, Serbia, Arizona and Mongolia, where communities are struggling to deal with the ongoing power asymmetry that accompanies Rio Tinto’s mining projects, and the inevitable social and environmental consequences that follow, all of which require greater transparency and accountability.

Read the LMN joint letter to Rio Tinto here

Last week the Andrew Lees Trust (ALT UK) participated at the Global Tailings Summit (GTS), hosted by United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Church of England Pension Fund. The event was held over the fourth anniversary of the Brumadinho mine tailings dam disaster, which killed 272 people and left a legacy of social and environmental devastation.

The Trust requested an invitation to attend in order to raise questions about how the new Global Tailings Management Institute and the Global Investor Commission on Mining 2030 will address the dissonance between verbal commitments to the Global Industry Standard for Tailings Management (GISTM), made by mining corporations like Rio Tinto, and the realities on the ground, for example at Rio Tinto’s QMM mine in Madagascar.

DOWNLOAD 2 PAGE BRIEFING ON QMM DAM FAILURES HERE

According to Earthworks, mine tailings facilities, which contain the processed waste materials generated from mining metals and minerals, are failing with increasing frequency and severity.

The global standard (GISTM) was set up in 2020 to improve industry practice around mine tailings management, increase safety, adopt a zero harm policy and thereby prevent disasters like Brumadinho from occurring again. The newly launched Institute of last week aims to provide an independent auditing body to ensure compliance with the GISTM.

Rio Tinto is one of the largest mining companies in the world and has emphasised its role in helping to set up and promote the GISTM.

However, Rio Tinto’s commitment to the standard is under question at its QMM mine site in Madagascar where four tailings dam failures have occurred since 2010 with significant impacts on local communities.

READ ABOUT THE DEAD FISH AND THE PROTESTS HERE

The company claims it has “no tailings” and “no tailings dam” at QMM (AGM 2022), thereby raising questions as to how it will achieve the GISTM and any safety standards needed to protect the local communities living adjacent to the mine from tailings dam failures and mine process wastewater seeping and overflowing from the QMM mining basin.

Rio Tinto’s assertions about no tailings or dam at QMM contradict the Malagasy Government’s requirements under the mine’s environmental plan. This demands that QMM construct a berm 4m high and 30m wide in order to contain its mining basin waters and prevent them from entering the surrounding environment (e.g., downstream lakes). This structure has the operational function of a dam. The risks to the local communities if the tailings dam and its tailings are not safely managed are considerable.

Rio Tinto says it will reach compliance with GISTM at QMM by August 2023, but it is hard to see how this will be achieved if it does not admit that QMM has mine tailings nor a tailings dam.

Following two tailings dam failures at QMM in February and March 2022, and the release of a million cubic feet of mining basin water, hundreds of dead fish appeared downstream in lakes where local people fish for food and livelihoods. A fishing ban was imposed until the cause of the fish kills could be determined.

Communities were plunged into food insecurity and lost their livelihoods as a result of the ban. Months of conflict ensued as villager’s usual survival strategies were compromised and they were left without sufficient aid and support to meet their daily needs. They were also scared to collect water from the local lake for drinking and domestic use, as is the practice for the majority of villagers living around the mine who still have no access to safe drinking water.

Multiple questions have been asked about the safety of the QMM tailings dam since 2017-2018, while the company was being held to account for breaching an environmental buffer zone and placing QMM mine tailings on the bed of adjacent Lake Besaroy, thereby exposing the local estuary system to mine contaminants, e.g., uranium and lead.

In addition to the breach, an independent risk assessment carried out by hydrology expert Dr Steven Emerman in 2018 deemed the risk of possible seepage and overflow from the QMM tailings dam to be “unacceptably high.”

Three of the four tailings dam failures have occurred at QMM since dam safety questions were raised with Rio Tinto about the QMM structure and tailings management.

Furthermore, in 2021, an analysis (Emerman 2021) of QMM’s Water Discharge Monitoring Data showed the “passive” or “natural” water management system at QMM appeared to be enhancing concentrations of contaminants in the mine’s settling ponds.

Rio Tinto conceded that the system was not working as expected and announced that QMM had, in fact, ceased discharging its mining basin waters as of August 2020 – a strategy only possible due to prolonged drought in the south.

The Anosy region, where the mine is located, is subject to frequent cyclones and heavy rainfall. In 2021, ALT UK and PWYP MG asked how the QMM strategy would work when the rains arrived? The answer came in 2022 with two tailings dam failures and an “exceptional release” of a million cubic metres of mining basin water (almost a billion litres).

The concern about the extent to which contaminants from QMM mine tailings and process wastewater from the QMM mining basin is impacting local water quality has driven inquiry from local to international level since 2017.

Using QMM water data, independent studies by experts in hydrology and radioactivity identified elevated levels of uranium in the QMM mine basin, and elevated levels of uranium and lead downstream of the QMM mine 50 and 40 times, respectively, the WHO safe drinking water guidelines.

ACCESS INDEPENDENT WATER AND OTHER STUDIES HERE

Villagers have reported a noticeable degradation of water quality since the QMM mine operations began. They complain of increased illness and health problems. Fisherfolk have reported significant loss of fish stocks and disappearance of certain fish species since 2009, with a resulting loss to their livelihoods and income. Land fertility around the mine has also reportedly fallen over the last ten years.

A field study by Publish What You Pay Madagascar (PWYP MG) in 2022 captured the communities’ grievances and losses, including an estimated 45% loss of their usual annual revenues as a result of the detrimental impact of the QMM mine on local natural resources.

The 2022 tailings dam failures exacerbated local communities’ hardships as well as their frustration with QMM, and further eroded trust in the Rio Tinto joint venture in Madagascar, which has seen multiple outbreaks of conflict since operations began.

The conflict that followed the 2022 tailings dam failures was disturbing. In particular, to see QMM deny responsibility for the fish deaths and thereby distance itself from the ensuing community hardships.

Both publicly and internally Rio Tinto has claimed no environmental impact from the tailings dam failures. They have done this by citing two studies produced by the Malagasy water regulator, ANDEA, which collected fish and water samples after the dead fish appeared in March 2022.

The ANDEA studies were accessed by Andrew Lees Trust in collaboration with Malagasy civil society. They have been reviewed and critiqued by hydrology, mining and radioactivity experts, who highlight how the studies fail to provide data for various metals that should have been tested, e.g., mercury and lead, and that “conclusions drawn in the reports are not based on sufficient evidence” (Swanson 2022).

The ANDEA reports were never publicly issued by the Malagasy government. Nevertheless, Rio Tinto has referenced these reports to defend QMM’s position, even though they clearly lack scientific rigour, raising questions about the company’s international standards and integrity.

Radioactivity expert Dr Swanson provided her own independent analysis using all the available data, including from a previous QMM tailings dam failure with accompanying fish kills in 2018. She demonstrated that the most probable cause of the 2022 fish kills was the QMM mining basin water, being high in aluminium and with low pH – a combination that causes asphyxiation in fish. However, because some metals were not tested, questions remain.

One thing is more certain. After four years of demanding baseline water data for the region and being told by QMM there was none, the Trust’s research with PWYP MG uncovered a 2001 pre-mining water study in which data show there were no issues with uranium and lead levels in local waterways prior to mining (Hatch &Associates 2001).

Rio Tinto has yet to answer to the comparison with pre-mining water indicators, as the company has repeatedly claimed that the elevated levels of uranium found downstream of QMM were all “naturally occurring.” The pre-mining baseline data shows this is not the case.

For the time being QMM focuses on the issue of the high aluminium and low pH in the process wastewater contained in the QMM mining basin. This is because QMM is not compliant for discharge levels of aluminium and cadmium in relation to Malagasy regulatory limits, so they cannot release their mining basin water without exceptional permission (as happened during the tailings dam failures in 2022).

There is no regulatory limit for uranium discharge in Madagascar and QMM’s pilot “treatment plant” for the high aluminium issue will not address high uranium and lead issues.

Access to information about the new pilot “treatment plant”, QMM water data, and other technical data has been an ongoing challenge for civil society, often taking months and anything up to a year or more of repeated prompts before QMM will release promised or requested information.

The difficulties to access data and reports from Rio Tinto/QMM bring the company’s transparency commitments to the GISTM into question.

For example, Rio Tinto/QMM promised that it would share the external evaluation of the tailings dam failures of 2022 with PWYP MG and ALT UK, and the findings with the Jesuits in Britain who raised questions at the Rio Tinto 2022 AGM. Almost one year later they still have not provided the report, but instead QMM issued summary papers to PWYP MG and ALT UK, which it claims present key findings:

SEE QMM REPORTING ON 2022 TAILINGS DAM FAILURES HERE AND HERE

These documents raise more questions than they answer, including how the “root cause” of a tailings dam failure and overflow incident is explained by the lack of inspection.

This and other pressing questions make it all the more urgent that QMM conform to the transparency commitments of the GISTM and other international standards.

The example of Rio Tinto’s subsidiary, QMM in Madagascar, offers a clear example of where the reality on the ground is not aligned with verbal commitments to the GISTM made by the parent company.

If companies like Rio Tinto, which positions itself to be a leader among the 26 ICMM members obligated to adhere to the GITSM and claiming to be at the forefront of change in the sector – if they do not adhere to the highest standards at all their operating sites, how will the remaining publicly listed mining companies be brought into line to accept and deliver improved practices and higher levels of responsibility and accountability?

The urgency of compliance – and the need for penalties for failure to comply – is all the more pertinent as the industry positions to increase mining exponentially to meet mineral demand for the energy transition.

Madagascar with its substantial mineral reserves against a backdrop of weak regulatory capacity, poor governance, high levels of poverty and human rights issues, risks to be one place where the absence of international standards such as the GISTM – or better still Safety First Guidelines for Responsible Mine Tailings Management – can only deepen hardships and catalyse conflict around mining.

Rio Tinto/QMM has released information about its recent grievance process and commitments agreed during a conflict resolution negotiation in May 2022 to address community losses and reduce tensions following months of protest.

See QMM PDF on the “doleances” process HERE

An analysis of the activity reported in the QMM PDF against international standards has given rise to questions and concerns. These have been sent to Rio Tinto by Publish what You Pay Madagascar (PWYP MG), Andrew Lees Trust (ALT UK) and an Anosy representative Tahiry Ratsiambahotra, who jointly attended a meeting with Rio Tinto in July.

See concerns about QMM’s process sent to Rio Tinto HERE

It has been more than four months since Malagasy government ministers negotiated the conflict resolution settlement between Antanosy protestors and Rio Tinto’s subsidiary in southern Madagascar.

The resolution process was designed to restore calm after months of protests by communities affected by an imposed fishing ban after dead fish were found downstream of QMM’s operations just days after a second mine tailings dam failure and the release of a million cubic metres of QMM mining basin process waters.

Read about tailings dam failures and dead fish HERE

At the time, QMM vehemently denied any link between mine process water quality released from its operations in March and the fish deaths, and claimed that government studies exonerated them. However, in response to a Memo by expert Dr Swanson on the probable cause of the fish kills, the company conceded “that it cannot rule out a potential link between the two events” (QMM response to Swanson Memo, June 2022).

Swanson determined that high levels of aluminium and low pH from the mine process water was the most probable cause of the fish deaths (anoxia), though other heavy metals were also of concern.

The fishing ban that followed the fish deaths left villagers without their usual source of food and loss of income from fisheries livelihoods for almost three months. During that time, community members occupied the Town Hall in Ft Dauphin, then later took to the streets. Finally, after failing to have their problems heard, they blocked the access road to the Rio Tinto/QMM mine and took hostages from regional security forces who were sent to evict them. 

The resolution process that followed required protestors to stop the road blockades. In contre partie the community made a series of demands which were agreed by QMM: firstly, to provide immediate cultural reparation to the communities by offering cows and rice for ceremonial cleansing after the shedding of blood – since some protestors had been hurt and arrested during the protests.

QMM also agreed to provide food aid that had initially been promised during the fishing ban but had not been delivered. QMM now report to have distributed emergency food aid to 7725 affected households in the Mandena area where the mine is situated.

Lastly, QMM were required to open a grievance process to address losses – not just for lost livelihoods during the time of the fishing ban but also for a decade of reported losses experienced by communities living around the mine .

See PWYP MG report on QMM impacts on communities HERE

News came in July that 8778 villagers had submitted complaints and claims against QMM but these were being “filtered”, and that QMM was not planning to offer financial compensation but would offer instead work to those who had experienced losses.

Latest news from the ground suggests that not all claimants will receive compensation, and the process is lacking in transparency. More details are needed to better assess the process and the situation on the ground.

In July, 8778 local people submitted complaints against QMM and are claiming reparation.

It is in Rio Tinto’s interests to get the grievance process right. Critically, the parent company must not rely upon QMM’s self-reporting, and must resolutely ensure QMM avoids any further distress and conflict in Anosy.

Transparent reporting of the QMM complaints /grievance process in full, independent, impartial investigations and adjudications, and an independent evaluation and audit of the grievance process, in line with international standards, will be essential to restore trust in the company and longer term stability in the region.

Much depends on the effectiveness and fairness of the outcomes of this process for Rio Tinto/QMM to uphold and honour the resolution agreements made in May with the affected communities and Government representatives.

Importantly, the process is a real test of whether both Rio Tinto and QMM have actually “reset”, as claimed, and are now addressing QMM’s Community Social Performance (CSP) that suffers from a deficit of trust, since QMM has been failing rural communities in Anosy for almost two decades.

Read more about Rio Tinto/QMM issues in Madagascar HERE