{"id":2648,"date":"2019-02-20T11:34:03","date_gmt":"2019-02-20T10:34:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ozeanien-dialog.de\/?p=2648"},"modified":"2019-05-23T11:54:37","modified_gmt":"2019-05-23T09:54:37","slug":"deep-sea-mining-threatens-indigenous-culture-in-papua-new-guinea","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ozeanien-dialog.de\/?p=2648&lang=en","title":{"rendered":"Deep sea mining threatens indigenous culture in Papua New Guinea"},"content":{"rendered":"
JC142 research cruise: reproduced with permission of the British Geological Survey, National Oceanography Centre \u00a9UKRI 2018.<\/span>, Author provided<\/span><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

John Childs<\/a>, Lancaster University<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

When they start mining the seabed, they\u2019ll start mining part of me.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

These are the words of a clan chief of the Duke of York Islands \u2013 a small archipelago in the Bismarck Sea of Papua New Guinea which lies 30km from the world\u2019s first commercial deep sea mine site, known as \u201cSolwara 1\u201d. The project, which has been delayed due to funding difficulties, is operated by Canadian company Nautilus Minerals<\/a> and is poised to extract copper from the seabed, 1600m below the surface.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
New Ireland Province \u2013 the Duke of York Islands are situated in the strait between the two land masses.<\/span>
\nCPUD-PW\/Wikipedia<\/a>, CC BY-SA<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Valuable minerals are created as rapidly cooling gases emerge from volcanic vents on the seafloor. Mining the seabed for these minerals could supply the metals and rare earth elements essential to building electric vehicles, solar panels and other green energy infrastructure<\/a>. But deep sea mining could also damage and contaminate<\/a> these unique environments, where researchers have only begun to explore.<\/p>\n

The industry\u2019s environmental impact isn\u2019t the only concern. It\u2019s been assumed by the corporate sector that there is limited human impact from mining in the deep sea. It is a notion that is persuasive especially when compared with the socio-ecological impacts of land-based mining.<\/p>\n

But such thinking is a fallacy \u2013 insights from my research with communities<\/a> in Papua New Guinea over the past three years highlight that the deep sea and its seabed should be thought of as intimately connected to humanity, despite the geographical distances involved. For the people of the Duke of York Islands, deep sea mining disturbs a sense of who they are, including the spirits that inhabit their culture and beliefs.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Young people on Duke of York Islands.<\/span>
\nPaul Hearne<\/span>, Author provided<\/span><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Out of sight, out of mined<\/h2>\n

In Western thought, the sea has not only been considered to be marginal to politics, but also as entirely distinct from the land. Separating nature from humanity has proved useful in enabling exploitation of the natural world for human means. Deep sea mining, with all its material connections between a dynamic seabed and sites of consumption on land, provokes new questions.<\/p>\n

If humanity can\u2019t physically encounter the deep seabed, then how are we to treat it ethically?<\/a>. By conceptually \u201cdistancing\u201d the deep ocean, who is being marginalised?<\/p>\n

For the people who live close to Solwara 1, the answer is pointed. These communities have long understood the world as a connection between \u201cnature\u201d, \u201cspirits\u201d and \u201cbeings\u201d. Central within this cosmology are the spirits \u2013 masalai \u2013 some of which are understood as guardians of the seabed and its resources.<\/p>\n

\"\"
The people of Duke of York Islands are tied spiritually to events in the deep sea.<\/span>
\nJohn Childs<\/span>, Author provided<\/span><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Masalai are a fundamental part of the islanders\u2019 world. Thus, the prospect of deep sea mining means not just social and economic disruption, but spiritual turmoil. The digging up of the seabed and the extraction of its resources cuts through the very fabric of their spiritual world and its sacred links to the sea and land.<\/p>\n

As the historian Neil Macgregor put it in the Radio 4 series \u201cLiving with the Gods\u201d, masalai are not<\/p>\n

out there\u2026 [like] tourists in the human realm, from somewhere else \u2026 but in a world in which we co-inhabit<\/a>.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The political implication for island communities here is clear. The copper which might be mined from the seabed is effectively constituted by these spirits. Thus, as copper \u201cresurfaces\u201d in the objects and technologies of the future \u2013 in batteries and wiring \u2013 it also carries a spirituality from the region where it originated.<\/p>\n

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