COAL VERSUS COMMUNITIES: Exposing poor practices by Vale and Rio Tinto in Mozambique

Mozambique has attracted two of the world’s largest mining companies – Brazil’s Companhia Vale do Rio Doce (Vale) and the Anglo-Australian multinational Rio Tinto – to extract coal from the huge fields in Tete province. In 2010, Vale and Rio Tinto were the second and third most valuable mining companies on earth – worth US$169 and US$83 billion respectively.

Vale has already developed a US$1.3-billion Moatize coal mine in Mozambique and made its first shipment of 2,200 metric tons of coal in August 2011 through the port of Beira. Rio Tinto is expected to start exporting coal in 2012 from its Benga project, which has an annual capacity of 2.4 million tons. Rio Tinto PLC (RIO) has also recently completed a US$4 billion acquisition of the Mozambiquefocused mining company, Riversdale Mining Ltd.