Women toil as scavengers at Bolivian mines

[Judi Lynn]

Women toil as scavengers at Bolivian mines
Thu 20 Mar 2008, 14:09 GMT
By Kevin Gray

POTOSI, Bolivia, March 20 (Reuters) - Clutching a hammer, Julia Flores squatted near a mound of rocks high on the slopes of Bolivia's biggest silver mine.

A 68-year-old mother of seven, Flores lifted and moved the rocks, pounding them with her hammer as she combed for metal scraps in the debris tossed aside by miners.

"It's the only job I've ever known," she said.

Flores is one of hundreds of women who scavenge on the copper-colored Cerro Rico, or Rich Mountain, that rises above this Bolivian mining city.

The silver, tin and zinc deposits buried in the mountain are the economic lifeline of Potosi, a Spanish colonial city founded four centuries ago. At around 4,200 meters (13,800 feet), it claims to be the world's highest city.

Most of the women are the widows or wives of miners who have died or fallen ill toiling in the mines, which have roared back to life in recent years as global mineral prices surged.

The growing international demand, led mostly by China and India, has set off a mining boom in Potosi, but the women are a stark reminder of the harsh economic realities in South America's poorest country.

For decades, women were largely barred from working inside the mines by men who said their presence brought bad luck.

Working in the shafts and crevices of the mines at Cerro Rico is dangerous. Most men use only a hard hat while breathing dusty air amid occasional rockslides and accidents from dynamite charges.

More:
http://africa.reuters.com/metals/news/usnN20355675.html?rpc=401&