ALMOST every part of your life and lifestyle is only made possible through mining minerals. Mining is very important to you, even if you don't know it. Majority of beauty products contain minerals like iron, talc, bismuth, zinc, and silica. Minerals are used in vitamins, soaps, toothpaste, shampoo, household medicines and just about every product you purchase and apply.
Jewelry, watches and mobile phones are not organically grown, they are made from gold, silver, platinum, cadmium, quartz, alloys and may include precious stones. Medical practices like angiography, stents, joint replacements, pace makers, minor and major surgery all require equipment that contain a very wide range of minerals.
Your home is made of minerals! In fact, the foundations are made of concrete and steel. The basic services in your home (water, electricity, gas) are conducted through copper and steel wires and pipes. You fill your home with all sorts of electronic gadgets to improve your quality of life. None of them are possible without mining the minerals that they are made from.
How many of us use wooden or plastic frying pans, pots, plates, cups, glasses and cutlery at home? That's right, the majority of us use these items that are made of minerals - minerals that have been mined.
If you use any of these modes of transport - aircraft, boat, car, bus, train, motorcycle, or bicycle, then you are relying on the by-products of mining. A significant variety and quantity of minerals are required to manufacture these vehicles without even considering the fuel to power it.
The surface most of these vehicles travel on (including what you walk on) - the roads, rails and concrete paths, are only possible because mining companies mined the minerals used to make these surfaces for you.
In our modern lifestyles, we cannot function without energy. Raw minerals are mined and sent to a power plant for refining. These raw fuels, the power plant and the transmission lines are all sourced and constructed from the minerals made only possible by mining.
Renewable Energy? Well, mining is still required. Again the foundations are made of concrete and steel. The equipment that processes the solar, wind or water energy is actually made of mined minerals. Renewable energy still requires power plants, transmission lines and substations to deliver the power to you. You still require the copper wires in your house and office to be able to receive the electricity to your power point or light switch.
Do you still think mining is unnecessary?
"Wise use of minerals grows in importance as nations becomes more industrialized and more urbanized. A technological society's complete dependence on mineral fuels, on machines made from refined metals, and on the vast number of everyday items made from various minerals contrasts sharply with life in the Stone Age.
The requirements of Stone Age people for minerals were simple—a stone that could be sharpened, or a rock that could be thrown. Man's requirements have become more complex with each new discovery that answered recognized needs, and each new research effort seems to create new demands for both the traditional materials and the less well-known and generally scarcer materials." ~ US Department of the Interior
“The conservation of natural resources is the fundamental problem. Unless we solve that problem it will avail us little to solve all others” ~ Theodore Roosevelt