Underneath Gold?s Glitter, Realities of Suffering, Dispossession
By Grace S. Uddin
DAVAO CITY (davaotoday.com) ? It?s easy to get mesmerized by the glitter of a gold ring. But there?s a story behind its allure.
It takes the excavation of 20 tons of soil to produce such a ring. Imagine for a second the toll such a process exacts. Destroyed land. Felled trees. Stripped mountains.
In the context of the Philippine countryside, include these: Displaced communities, dispossessed families, violence, even death.
Such is the havoc large-scale mining has wrought in many communities in the Philippine countryside, anti-mining activists said last week.