Building a Cellphone That Doesn't Kill People (Fast Coexist)

[OneGrassRoot]

The FairPhone is made with fairly mined minerals, built under good labor conditions, and is entirely recyclable--all things your current phone probably isn’t.

Bas van Abel leads an innovative electronics company. But, unlike Apple or Samsung, he’s not particularly interested in the latest voice activation or finger-swiping technology. No. He’s keener to see disruption in the back-end: in the mines producing minerals like tin and tantalum, the factories that make phones, and the systems that recycle them.


Controversy has dogged the phone supply chain recently. Apple has been criticized for troubles at Foxconn, its enormous Chinese supplier. Campaigners like Global Witness and the Enough Project have shed light on African mines that fund warlords, and employ child labor (see also here). And, there are continuing stories about how e-waste recycling puts distant workers at risk, and pollutes the environment.

Van Abel, who is based in Amsterdam, thinks there’s demand out there for something different. Later this year, his company will start selling a phone that looks and acts much like other products--but comes with greater safeguards. FairPhone, which is a social enterprise that recycles profit for social ends, is sourcing minerals through nonprofit initiatives like the Conflict Free Tin Initiative and Solutions For Hope. It is choosing factories in China that meet high standards set by Labor Voices, an advocacy group. And it’s working with recycling groups, such as Closing The Loop. It wants to build a phone that fits "circular economy" principles, where valuable materials are easily extracted after-use, and repurposed.

Van Abel got the idea while working at a research lab. A nonprofit asked how it could raise awareness of conflict minerals, and Van Abel felt the standard answers were inadequate. "We thought, the best case scenario was that we could make people angry. But then what? Actually, there is no alternative for people to take. You can choose green energy and fair-trade chocolate. But you can’t choose a phone with a better vision on ethics. So we said: 'why not just make this phone?'"

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