Restore Health in Cerro de Pasco

Thanks to the Swedish Postcode Lottery's funds and thanks to your donations, we can now start collecting new information and data on the psychological health of children of the mining city of Cerro de Pasco. These data will be a very powerful tool to be used in the legal case that we are carrying out.

The newest investigation is focused on the Intellectual Quotient Test on children (6-14 years old) of the Paragsha community to establish the causal link between heavy metals human exposure and the onset of neuropsychological and behavioral problems.

Lead, manganese, mercury and aluminum are neurotoxic substances that reduce learning and concentration potential. Metals have been measured in very high concentrations in the environment surrounding the mine and in the bodies of the children of Paragsha, but no studies on this population have already researched and established the effects.

This type of investigation is widespread in mining areas when there is a need to attribute responsibilities to polluters but it has never been done in Cerro de Pasco.

Unfortunately, because of the worsening of the COVID-19 health situation in Peru, we cannot travel to the area.

Still, we are managing all steps from Italy, training local people to follow all technical aspects linked with the organization of the Intellectual Quotient Test.

This test will be realized by seven psychologists from the national institution MENSA with a headquarter in LIMA who will travel to Cerro de Pasco soon.

Another important part of this study includes the heavy metal concentration analysis on dust deposition samples that will be collected for one month in urban areas closed to mining plants. This data will be useful to determine the link between human exposure to contaminated dust and health impacts such as those we measured during the medical investigation in 2018, and the one we will measure this time.

This study, along with others we realized until now, is critical to enriching the evidence of environmental contamination and human rights violations in the mining-affected community of Cerro de Pasco.

As always, we will update you about the process and the results!

Stay tuned!

The story of the property of the mine of Cerro de Pasco is long and complex. The mine has changed property several times over the years and it is about to change again in these days. However, there is a common pattern. It does not matter who is the owner of the mine. The situation for the people of Cerro de Pasco remains the same. 

The area is known to be mined since the pre-Hispanic era and historians suggested that a part of the silver of the ransom of Atahualpa came from that area. As we all know Pizarro collected the silver of the ransom and killed Atahualpa anyway. A few years later the conquistadores started mining in the area and they did it for more than four centuries. At the beginning of the XIX century the US based Cerro de Pasco Copper Corporation started the industrial mine and the open pit. The mine was subsequently nationalized in the 60s and then the then president Alberto Fujimori (now in jail for crimes against humanity) privatized it the 90s for a hugely underprized bet that was won by Volcan. The bet starting quote was 60 million dollars (the mine was producing 60 million dollars revenues each year) and Volcan won it with a bet of 60 million and one dollar.

In the early 2000^th, when criticisms and concerns over the management of the mine started rising Volcan sold the mine to Cerro SAC a company that was owned 99,9% by Volcan and 0,1% by Buenaventura mine. Then they start to fragment the property into several parts. The pit owned by a subsidiary, the stockpiles owned by another one, the processing one by another one and so for.

We then get to the 2019 when the biggest mining company in the world, Glencore, acquired the majority of the shares of Volcan and therefore they basically become the owner of the mine. Nevertheless, Glencore tried to sell the mine from the very beginning and now they are in negotiation with Cerro de Pasco Resources, a Canadian company that is rising capital in order to acquire all the parts of the mine. They claim to have the hands over the biggest over-ground mineral deposit on earth: the stockpile of El Excelsior. The acquisition process should be finalized in these days.

The other side of the story is that the reality for the people of Cerro de Pasco has never changed. Every new company accuse the previous one to be the responsible of the pollution and no one has yet started a cleaning plan.

Our studies have demonstrated several time how the pollution is both historical and actual. The normal rules of trading recognize that if you buy a property you acquire profits and liabilities but this it seems to not be the case in Cerro de Pasco.

For the population all these changes in property do not reflect in any change in their lives. Their lives are still unbearable due to the pollution and they are still unable to have a life in dignity and wellbeing. People are dying and getting sick and all of these ownership changes do not affect their life at all.