Curious Worldview

Nicolas Niarchos | Cobalt, China & The Congo... The Elements Of Power

• Ryan Faulkner • Episode 219

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In this episode, New Yorker journalist Nicolas Niarchos discusses the supply chains behind the clean energy transition from child miners and Chinese-owned mega-mines to the coming global scramble for critical minerals.

I’ve been eagerly anticipating his new book, and I reckon it is tailor made for this podcast. It’s the history of cobalt it’s extraction and it’s applications and shows how a single mineral has reshaped geopolitics, powered the rise of China’s technological superiority, and further locked millions of Congolese into one of the most brutal extraction economies on earth.

This is a story that begins with King Leopold the second the original plunder of the Congo but then runs through Cold War dictatorships and kleptocracy, and ends with Apple, Tesla, BYD, and the race to dominate the future of energy.

It’s Nic’s second appearance on this podcast on a similar subject, therefore we avoided to go-over all the same ground as last time. The first episode was about his New Yorker piece on artisanal mining in the Congo, his arrest in the Congo and the foundations for his worldview in covering this issue.

Today we go into his new book. Inside the mines of Katanga, inside the rise of China’s battery empire, inside the corruption that still governs Congo’s political system, and inside the coming resource wars that will define the next half-century.

  • Eighty percent of the world’s cobalt now comes from the Congo.
  • Most of it is controlled by Chinese companies.
  • As much as 20% of it is still dug out of the ground by hand.
  • Kinshasa, Congo’s capital, is expected to have 40,000,000 people by 2050.

And the world is about to need more of what’s beneath their feet than ever before.


SPEAKER_00

This interview is about that impossible negative externality shifted onto others that without would ground modernity to a halt. Nicholas Niarkost is one of the few journalists who has gone deep enough into the mines, the supply chains, the politics and the boardrooms to tell the full story of Cobalt and the country to which its greatest deposits are attached, the Congo. Nick is a journalist for The New Yorker and a myriad of other publications, where he spent years reporting on war, corruption, and the global resource economy. His work has taken him from conflict zones to trading floors and from artisanal mining pits worked by children to the corporate headquarters of the companies that now control their loot. I've been eagerly anticipating his new book, which is titled Elements of Power, and I reckon that it is tailor-made for this podcast. It's the history of cobalt, its extraction and its applications, and shows how a single mineral has reshaped geopolitics, powered the rise of China's technological superiority, and further locked millions of Congolese into one of the most brutal extraction economies on Earth. This is a story that begins with King Leopold's original plunder of the Congo, but then runs through Cold War dictatorships, the myriad and ongoing kleptocracy that has happened since, and then ends with Apple, Tesla, BYD, and the race to dominate the future of energy. It's Nick's second appearance on this podcast on a similar subject. Therefore, we made an attempt and avoided to go over the same ground as we covered last time. The first episode was about his New Yorker piece on artisanal mining in the Congo, his arrest in the Congo, and the foundations for his worldview in covering this issue. But today we go into the book. Inside the minds of Katanga, inside the rise of China's battery empire, inside the corruption that still governs Congo's political system, and inside the coming resource wars that will define the next half century. 80% of the world's cobalt now comes from the Congo. Most of it is controlled by Chinese companies, and as much as 20% is still dug out of the ground by hand. Kinshasa, Congo's capital, is expected to have 40 million people by 2050, and the world is about to need more of what's beneath their feet than ever before. And now, without any further ado, it is my pleasure to welcome Nicholas Nyarkost back to the podcast. Mr. Nyarkost, thank you so much for joining me again. I've been eagerly anticipating this interview.

SPEAKER_01

It is great to be back with you, Ryan.

SPEAKER_00

And you were of great help to me as well in getting in touch with and maybe even preparing a little bit for the John Lee Anderson interview. So I really, really appreciate that because I think that stands to this day as one of the coolest experience this podcast has allowed me. We recorded in person on the Stage of the Frontline Club. And I wonder if you watched the New Yorker documentary on Netflix that recently did. What did you make of it?

SPEAKER_01

I thought it was great. I thought it, you know, it it it was a kind of novel thing, and it's kind of i i I don't think it's really been done before. This idea of using the way that the magazine comes together as a kind of narrative structure, and it's so kind of obvious, but but sort of hasn't been done, and it w it's just kind of genius. I I I'm uh I was I was very impressed and I um I I really like the way that people came off. Uh I think they really kind of represented the atmosphere of the office at at its best. A testament to a hundred years of a great magazine, and um, you know, I I I I worked there for five years almost, um, and I still write there and I still go through the editorial process. Um, so I kind of knew what to expect, but I still found it fascinating, and I thought it was great, and there were little bits and pieces that I picked up which I didn't know beforehand and so on.

SPEAKER_00

As did I. Um, but you did get a sense through through watching it that the heyday was sort of in the past. So that was celebrating its hundred-year anniversary. Do you think it'll make a hundred more?

SPEAKER_01

Well, I hope so. I don't know. I mean, it's a great magazine, they continue to publish great stories. Um, you know, they have great new writers, they have, you know, Antonia Hitchens, they have Ava Kaufman, um, you know, many of the people who who came up with me as as fact-checkers are are now, you know, doing really great stories. And and, you know, they've still got the greats, they've got the John Lee Andersons, they've got the Jane Mayers, they've got the, you know, all these people who are really, who are really at the top of their game, um, uh as well as young writers who are at the top of their game as well. And what I will say, however, we are we being a couple of people who used to work at the New Yorker and and um people, you know, who who still feel very much part of the New Yorker family in some sense, uh, like myself, you know, I wrote a piece on Sudan last year and did a radio radio hour with David Remnik. Uh and um we're doing a uh magazine really focused on global storytelling and and very long-form storytelling. You know, we we we have a lot of like, you know, 20,000-word pieces in the pipeline about you know, Mexican cartels and Ukrainian adoptions and Chinese travelers, and I mean we've some really fascinating stories from all over the all over the world. You know, the my answer to your question would be yes, there is still space for the New Yorker to exist because it's you know, there are still people who want to do other cool things in this space, very much inspired by the New Yorker, but the New Yorker is kind of the OG, the inspiration. Um, you know, every week when I see the magazine, I'm kind of in awe. And um, you know, I mean that's testament to what David has done at the magazine and some of the other editors and you know, the artists and writers and so on. Um, and our magazine is going to be called Now Voyager, and the the website will be out in February, mid mid-February, I want to say it will be a sign-up page, uh, now voyager mag.com. Sorry for the plug, but I thought I should get it out there, but we'll we'll try and get some some of your some of our writers.

SPEAKER_00

Oh, that's incredible. So I I think I maybe missed the first part of that.

SPEAKER_01

This is a offshoot of the New Yorker, or this is a new project that it's not it's not an offshoot of the New Yorker, it has nothing to do with the New Yorker, it's it's uh you know, we set it up as a as a non-profit because you know the economics of running a print magazine are really, really complicated. Um and uh you know, we're raising money, um, and we have a little bit of money to do the first couple of issues, and we're really just hoping that you know people will be excited by what we are doing um because we're excited by it, and we think that these are stories that deserve to be told. And the fact is that there are just not enough magazines publishing long form journalism these days, um, and I think we can we we can just be another place in which long form is published.

SPEAKER_00

I absolutely love the sound of that. The amount of times I've sort of romantically thought about the idea of some Australian or maybe um Southeast Asian Australian focused New Yorker type thing. But as soon as you start looking into it, you realise the economics of the whole thing would require the most insane amount of work for very, very, very little security or certainty at all. Just bringing that up because I feel like there is an instinct and a hunger and an appetite for this type of work, but maybe only theoretically. Once you get into it and you're forced to pay a subscription and do you actually keep up with the cadence of reading it, you know, twice a month and so forth, then it becomes really hard. But my God, if you look at the just the artist state, and you know I interview so many different journalists and they all feel relatively the same about it. It's moving away from the masthead and more towards the individual. The individual carries a reputation and they can extract a lot more of whatever the advertising dollars is that they might bring in. Um but people following individual journalists and less so than the masters themselves, but you require that master to create the great stories because economically they just make no sense at all, and a lot of other people's work needs to support it. So it's a complicated mix, but I'm absolutely stoked that you're launching that. I had no idea. I can't wait.

SPEAKER_01

You know, I I think in the first the first issue we have a story from New Zealand. Uh and sorry, I'm just thinking about um Oceania and Southeast Asia and so on. And then we have a we actually have two great Australia stories later in the year. Um both of well, one of which will have incredible photography, and the other one is is is um hopefully going to be um illustrated. We have a we have a we have a very cool idea for the illustration for it. So anyway. Um I won't say any more because because I don't want to tread on the journalist's feet.

SPEAKER_00

Is this your project? Your editorial? Are you ownership? Like what does this look like?

SPEAKER_01

So it's a it's a it's a non-profit, it's like a charity, it's r run by a board. Um but yeah, I mean uh it's a it's it's uh me and a co-founder. She's called Elaine Werner, she was also a fact checker at The New Yorker. Um she's a very capable and thoughtful person and and and uh is a kind of um very much dynamo. Um and uh you know we're putting it together and we have an editorial team of um I think it's like twelve, fourteen people now, and then a bunch of people freelancing, freelance fact checkers and so on, um, who are really um who are really um going to be uh getting stuck into this into the these these articles and and and we've got the first issue almost laid out, which is very exciting.

SPEAKER_00

Unbelievable. Let's transition on to the book. So in the afterwood to the book, uh you write that since Leopold the Congo has continued to serve as a country of extraction for international companies. Can you give us a brief timeline? Since Leopold and to now the companies, the country to which they are attached, and the resources that have been extracted, just so we can get a very high-level idea of just how much abuse this country has received in the last 150 years.

SPEAKER_01

Okay. Well, I mean I'm gonna focus specifically in the region of Katanga um because there are lots of companies doing things like logging or um or mining uh tin and tantalum in in different parts. Um, you know, for example, the Belgian mining company Geomine um uh was you know existed until the late 70s and was was was used as a kind of uh as a cash cow for the dictatorship of Mabutu. Um but let's let's let's go to to to Katanga and to Copper and Cobalt specifically because this is what the book is about, focus on. And I um and I I know this history better than I do tin mining concerns in in the kibus or or or the logging concerns. And that's not to say that other parts of Congo haven't been track treated in incredibly extractive ways. Um but essentially, you know, um just to give you an idea of you know, Leopold II of Belgium takes Congo as a piece of personal property in 1885 after the Berlin Conference and creates all these companies sort of make you know make the extraction of Congo's wealth their business. And uh it starts really with ivory and to some extent got a little bit of gold prospecting, uh, and then it goes to rubber very famously. Rubber um there there is a kind of uh horrendous and very, very brutal uh trade in rubber that is that is spurred by a boom in uh car tires and bicycles. Um uh and then and then uh that sort of dies out um as rubber plantations are are planted elsewhere in the world. Um but for a very brief period Congo has a kind of monopoly on rubber. And then um and then we get to Katanga. So Katanga is is taken in 1891, uh which is uh it's the southern part of Congo. Um and the Belgians the Belgians execute the king there, uh a king called Massiri, and Massiri is um is himself a kind of slave trader and very complicated figure. Um but you know he is essentially uh a king of a very copper-rich land, and copper um in the form of these ingots was used as a these cross-shaped ingots, that's why I'm making the cross-shaped with my hand, um, uh, was used as a sort of uh currency in pre-colonial Africa. There's a very good book by Eugenia W. Herbert, called, God, what's it called? It's called, I think, red gold, um, copper in pre-colonial Africa or something like that, um uh published by the University of Wisconsin, um, and uh and sort of talks uh about how Katanga had these Smith Kings and how um how mining was a form of wealth and kingship um even before the Belgians arrived. Um so as the rubber trade is um is uh is kind of criticized by the rest of the world and the Belgians kind of realize that they're the or the and the Belgians and the price of rubber goes down because of these these these rubber plantations and the rest of the in the rest of the world. And also um as Leo Leopold is kicked out of Congo by his own parliament because of the abuses that his cronies are are inflicting on the Congolese people, you know, they're cutting people's arms off if they don't meet their rubber quotas, they're they're brutalizing the local population. Um as that is happening, the Belgian eyes have already moved to another very um uh uh another very important metal, an important metal for industrialization, which is copper in the south. Um and copper uh in the southern DRC because of a sort of fluke of geology and the way that these salts dried on an ancient sea and so on. Um the the copper is linked to a metal called cobalt. Uh cobalt is seen at first as an impurity in the copper, but by the 1960s, 1950s, 1960s, it is it has become a fairly important industrial mineral. It's used in in airplane engines, in in strengthening steel. There's even a cobalt bomb, um, atomic bomb, which is built. Um and at the moment at that time, all the companies that are extracting copper and cobalt are Belgian. They are called Union Minière Um du Okatanga. Um and the Union Minière is uh a basically kind of parastatal company. It stands in for the state in in the southern part of the colony. Very, very powerful, very, very wealthy. When Congo becomes independence, independent, it sponsors a sort of counter-independence movement or a separatist movement in the south uh under a politician called Moish Chombe, and um and they s secede and try to find a m found a mining state. This also happens with the diamond mining company and another leader up in a up in another state called Kasai, but but let's leave that to one side. Um and um anyway, so the uh so the Uniominia sponsors the separatist movement, they uh there's this kind of mega standoff, the UN gets involved, um, and uh Mois Trombe is beaten back to this point where he's holed up in the main copper refinery of uh of Kolwaesi in 1963, and he said he's gonna blow up he's gonna blow it all up, blow it all sky high, and people come and they negotiate, they say, look, this you're gonna set the develop development of the country back, just go into exile, um and uh and so he does. Um and at that point the Union starts to go, well, it has a couple of years where it's sort of sitting there as a Belgian concern, but as Mabutu Sesiseko, who is the um uh who is the dictator who has taken control in Congo during these years of crisis, um takes power, he starts to um put a uh he starts to sort of put the Kaibosh on on on Belgian control of the Union and it becomes through various different name changes and so on by the early nineteen seventies it becomes uh Jek Amin. Oh sorry, by the late 1960s, actually by 68, 69, becomes Jek Amin. And Jek Amin is a is a Congolese company with some connection to its previous Belgian holdings, but it's essentially a Congolese company which becomes more and more Congolese and it's used uh as a cash cow for the Mabutu government. Mobutu is the is the paradigm, he's the archetype of of the corrupt uh uh dictator of those years. I mean, he's buying palaces around all around the world in Brazil, and it's a very important thing. The kleptocrats kleptocrat. The kleptocrats, he's the the OG kleptocrat in many ways in many ways. Um and you know, he's built this palace in the jungle with a runway so the Concord can land there. I mean, it's it's just it's sort of farcical. And by the early 1990s, he's sort of stolen everything, and the Jekylmine is collapsing in on itself, and he basically gives license to uh people who work for for Jeky Amin to uh come and to go onto the plots or onto the mine site sites and start digging out the minerals themselves. And that's really what happens is that is that you have this explosion or this I mean not an explosion compared to what it became because you know, by the time Ubuntu left, many more people would be going onto the mines, but it you see you have this beginning of uh uh what was known as artisanal mining, um which is sort of hand mining and then this kind of practice of smuggling out the minerals um uh to be sold in Johannesburg's Hong Kong Square, and then then it goes to refineries in China, um, or or or other company uh countries at that time as well, and then and then gets put into the metal. Um it gets refined into metal. Um so so there you have it. You have the kind of the the the the move from Belgian Bel Belgian paristatal statal to Congolese paristatal, and then suddenly there's you know Mabutu Um because he supports the wrong side uh I mean because he he he allows the Hutus in after the Rwandan genocide, he pisses off the Rwandans, and the Rwandans scheme to uh overthrow Mabutu, they see him as a security threat. And uh in 1997 this invasion starts, first Congo War, and you get um you get a new government under Laurent Désiré Kabila, who uh believes that Jek Amin is this kind of amazing, you know, edifice. I mean, back in the day people used to say Jekimin Jobaba, Jekylmin Joman, which is uh which means Jekamine is my father, Jek Amin is my mother, and and you know, it was a company that during the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s as well, you know, did everything for you know it was a b it was basically the the the state. It was it provided work, it provided food, it provided health care, it provided housing um for people in this part of the world. Um so you really need to, you know, you really need to understand that this was a really important company. It was like as important as the government, and it completely collapsed in on itself, but it still had these incredibly powerful um and and and rich assets. Um so the new leader, um even before he had won the war, started auctioning them off to the highest bidder um at these at this uh hotel called the Carabia in Lubumbashi, and I go into this uh in the book. I mean it's this kind of an insane situation when you have people from major institutions, you know, banks like HSBC, Morgan Stanley, um, you know, De Beers, um you have you have uh uh Anglo American uh and then you have these kind of other these other uh sort of smaller um uh mining companies like American Mineral Fields, um, and uh and um Anvil mining and so on were coming in from I think Anvil is Australian so maybe you know them but uh you know coming in from other parts of the world they and and you know that is essentially the moment that this that this kind of system of uh the current system of corruption is really born um that you have these these foreign entities coming in and buying things for basically whatever price the government in Kinshasa um uh sa says it is and you know that's often done on a handshake and so on and um and and it leads to some very bad deals being done and you know a lot of these companies all also get ripped off. I mean we think of we think of these evil people coming in from the outside and exploiting the Congolese but it was very it's very very clear when you read the history that the Congolese I mean and I'm not saying you're everyday Congolese person on the street but it's very clear that the the people in power in Congo were also trying to screw the people um in uh you know the be the the businessmen who were coming in to to to buy the mine sites um it there's a there's a there's a famous saying which is when when elephants fight the grass gets trampled and the the you know the every you know the everyday Congolese um is the person who loses out as these kind of big as these big deals get done and then and reneged on.

SPEAKER_00

So moving on from that Belgium occupation and the various international institutions that came in and tried to extract what they could you do write in the book that 80% of the cobalt supply now is in fact Chinese. Yeah. So when when did they enter the picture?

SPEAKER_01

So the Chinese entered the picture actually fairly late. You know they had always had a foothold in Congo. This is to do with the kind of Cold War um and um various different you know issues around the Soviets getting control, the Americans getting control they they supported these guerrillas in the east who were nominally Maoist but actually psychotic and were killing people in front of a Lumumba statue and I don't know what. But uh the so yes there always was a Chinese connection to Congo and and you know they had a very good relationship with Mabutu after his state visit there in 73 or 74. You know he actually came back and said everybody should be saying calling each other citizen and I'm citizen Mabutu and I don't know what um and he sort of adopted this Mao style dress and portraiture and what have you. Yes the conditions for Chinese being there had always been there. I think what you saw during the artisanal mining boom um that that that sort of coincided with um a uh policy under the Chinese Premier Zhang Zemin uh uh which was China goes out and China goes out was a policy that uh made Chinese people trying to uh sorry made Chinese people want to go um oh sorry the Chinese government uh directed its citizens to go out and you know make make good in the world and so you got this influx of Chinese citizens because uh funny enough I was told that people like to go to places like Congo because you know in China because of the one child policy oftentimes of a certain generation that there are very few um there are few very few girls in in people's towns or villages whatever it is and so they and so so they go to Congo to find a wife or they go to Congo to find riches or they go to Congo to find you know whatever it is um kind of gold rush style. So so so yeah you get these small Chinese companies and then really the the the game changes in 2007 with the the deal of the century which is um um Joseph Kabila I mean you already have Chinese companies uh going and buying artisanal product but you have Joseph Kabila the president doing a deal with the um Chinese government and and also strangely this like kind of at that point really mid-tier Chinese company to to to to have the biggest copper cobalt mine in in Katanga at that time um and then and that was a sort of resources for an infrastructure deal you know Congo was selling its resources in order to get um you know China to come and build roads and so on and then in the wake of that you had these huge Chinese companies that came in China Molly Company um CATL you had a whole range of different important companies um who have really changed the landscape of mining in Katanga um because they have brought in industrial mines where there where there were no industrial mines or or whether there was where there were small industrial mines beforehand.

SPEAKER_00

Trevor Burrus And that's around 2007 the Chinese influence really started to uh firm its grip.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah I mean I would say mid-2000s I mean uh the the deal was star that began in 2007 I think it was finalized in 2009.

SPEAKER_00

Aaron Ross Powell It's interesting to read your book in combination with Pat McGee's Apple in China because it was also around that same time that the unparalleled in history level of manufacturing in terms of per units per day at such a high quality kicked off as well. So presumably the supply chain was had extra demand at that stage because of these incredible generational agreements that were being made between Apple and China. And therefore downstream all of the knowledge transfer that could come after.

SPEAKER_01

Well I think it was I think it was quite explicit. I mean I think that the the Communist Party decided that they needed to build electric cars to to reduce um pollution and yes their pilot schemes came a little bit later. But I think they understood I mean uh the the book tells a story of Wang Chan Fu who is the uh chairman of BYD one of the biggest um electric vehicle manufacturers in the world now but also incredible I mean that you've really got to admire the hustle there. I mean it's like this guy built something from like you know built a Tesla killer built a built a one of the most valuable tech tech companies from literally a machine shop in a you know in Shenzhen basically I yeah so um you know he had help from the Chinese Communist Party along the way but like it is pretty impressive I have to say yeah help from the Chinese Chinese Communist Party but in the most competitive environment that would even rival something like Silicon Valley.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah I mean I I I would say almost much more cutthroat. So I'm just trying to get a sense for the board here because if um 80% of the cobalt supply is Chinese how does that square with all the artisanal miners? Do the artisanal miners just extract such a small quantity of that amount or are they in effect freelancing for these Chinese companies? And then because cobalt and copper exist in the same region and Robert Friedman famously has the largest copper mine in the Congo he's not Chinese his company's Canadian like how does that all sort of uh play together?

SPEAKER_01

I think he has the largest copper mine in the co in Congo but his company is not Canadian. It is majority owned by Chinese companies is that a fact I thought Ivanhoe was a Canadian it's listed on the Canadian Exchange at least yeah but it's uh I think it's mining is the um is the uh is the majority shareholder yeah because he he raised the money from China essentially um so yes Friedland himself is now Canadian I think he started life as an American but um but uh so yeah I mean I think it's like whatever it's like fifteen out of the eighteen or fifteen out of the seventeen largest mines in this this figure is in the book are Chinese or have some kind of Chinese influence. There is I think ERG ERG is Kazakh and then Moomi and um and KCC mine are owned by Glencore but uh but otherwise everything else is Chinese MMG which started as an Australian mine that is now Chinese Ivanhoe to all intents and purposes is Chinese you know Tanki Fungarume is now Chinese and then all these other mines.

SPEAKER_00

Doesn't that introduce the geopolitics then of the ownership of this extremely critical resource in the supply chain? Like what's going to happen when Trump learns about that there is an Africa called the Congo and decides to set his sights on it?

SPEAKER_01

I think he's already learnt that I think on the 4th of December cold morning in Washington Paul Kabukagame and Chiseked who's the so the leader of Rwanda the leader of the president of Congo the president of Rwanda um signed a peace deal to stop this fighting in the East between Rwanda in fact militia group and and and the Congolese army and um lo and behold the next stop for for Chisiketti was the State Department where they signed a deal um to a critical metals deal um to secure the US's critical metals supply chain and as we're speaking today um the first shipments of copper uh to the United States from Southern DRC have been arranged um by a company called Mercuria um and this is this is seen as the first step in a uh you know new critical metal supply chain for for the US um so and Trump has talked about it in his speeches as well and and you know um who would have who would have thunk it several years ago Trump talking about about Congo but um but he certainly does um he sees it still in terms of the electric vehicle supply chain but I think that there's a very very important defense component to this and I I think that you know batteries that go into US military drones and you know night vision goggles and whatever they they have to make sure that that's all in a supply chain that is not controlled by the Chinese.

SPEAKER_00

So that's I think a very very big part of that that happened under the Biden administration there was a um there was a defense review um where they realized that actually they had a lot of their supply chain was coming from China and so they worked very very hard I spoke to the guy who who did that they worked hard to get the Chinese out of their supply chain but given the sheer unpredictability of the man and the fact that he's still in power and he's talking about Cuba he's talking about Greenland is there any world where on the horizon he's just decides I'm gonna pay much more attention to the Congo and excise out all of this Chinese influence?

SPEAKER_01

Yes I I think they're trying to do that. I think they're trying to do it through diplomacy. That doesn't sound like Trump. Well I think Congo I think any military action in Congo would be very very problematic for the US military. I d I think it's a huge country you know large amounts of um inhospitable, hostile terrain jungle so on.

SPEAKER_00

Do they want to be fighting another Vietnam go further into that because it's one of the most incredible details about the Congo which is just how vast and sheer it is and even Katanga specifically just how hard to access is this place and then also tie onto it as well the problem of all the infrastructure being private in the area and how this just perpetuates all of the lack of opportunity, the continued generational lack of opportunity.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah I mean I think that Congo is a difficult there's a bit at the end of King Leopold's Ghost which is which is the you know landmark incredible book about the crimes of King Leopold and and his cronies in in in Congo and and they and there's a bit at the end where he says something like you know it wasn't that the Belgian colonial project was any more cruel and brutal than any other colonial project. It may have may have had some particularly nasty features but um but it was also to do with the fact that Congo was so vast and so inaccessible in so many places that to do what they had been tasked to do, which is to extract rubber from from this colony or extract minerals from gold, metals, whatever it is you know, it was a v in very, very difficult to do without you know at that time without without employing such harsh meth methods. So it is an incredibly difficult place to um to to operate in even today um I I would say that that that a lot of um you know as you identify corruption basically is is is the thing that um creates uh creates a lot of that uh friction um because you know there are my roads going to these mine sites and so on but um private companies have been given the ability to shut down those roads in order to search for metals or whatever it is that are being smuggled out. So it's this kind of like stuff that is nominally state infrastructure has been privatized by these kind of by these by these um you know mega mega companies by these mega Chinese companies.

SPEAKER_00

And what does it mean for a community when you don't have state infrastructure, reliable roads to transport between one village and the next?

SPEAKER_01

I think it it it you know it slows commerce it slows development. I think it slows you know um people being able to live live their lives. I've worked in all kinds of places around the world and and one of the most important things is transport infrastructure. Once you know a road gets cut off you cut off you know trade and economy and and uh and the ability to be for people to go and see each other and exchange and so on. So yeah.

SPEAKER_00

And I read somewhere that Kinshasa is supposed to have forty million people by twenty fifty which would make it one of the great metropolises of the world and obviously that's far away from Katanga. But how do you think about the Congo's future in this scenario where they just have continued extraction after extraction essentially no state capacity to support the existing population and a growing population on top of that. It just seems like every single detail compounds on itself to a worse future.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah I I fear that that that that is the case. I mean if you look at even cities like Kolwasium they've exploded over the past couple of years. Kinsasa I mean Kinshasa has always been fairly safe um compared to the east of Congo and even Kasai and various other places. So it is it is a massive mega city and nobody really knows how many people there are because there has not been a census done in a very very long time you know the infrastructure is collapsing in on itself traffic is absolutely horrendous. I mean you you can't imagine the traffic in the in the city I mean to get to the airport sometimes you're spending five six hours. And and it's a r it's a really serious issue. I mean I think that um you know it's a it's a country in which um you you certainly feel exactly what what what you said is becoming almost I don't want to say unlivable but it's just stuck in this spiral and it's very very difficult to see how it's going to get out of it. That said I mean there are some pretty obvious and simple things to do um you know build up the capacity uh for agriculture um and have people do things that are not mining um especially in Katanga um and you know uh crackdown on corruption um introduces you know the the rule of law um free and fair elections all these things are super super important because if you see the president stealing and you know you know wearing a new Patek Philippe watch every day and whatever it is um and then you're a police officer on the side of the road um you're gonna say okay well you know if he's stealing why not what why not me um yeah and um so I think that that really trickle that trickles down and I think that that that that's really problematic. And then I I really think that you know the other thing is that these big companies and mining companies and so on and and and and and honestly like people like to beat up on on on Glencore um there are certain certainly issues around um you know fixes and transactions that were made in the twenty tens that that are you know I go into in detail in the book that that that were that were that were problematic and you know people have been sanctioned and they've been fined and so on. But when you go to the mine these days it's a modern mine they they have real environmental protections they really like they really care about safety I mean um it was it was I mean it's very very clear that safety is a very important um uh uh part of their process there um and of course they've had you know toxic spells and things like that in in the past but they do seem to be careful about um trying to trying to mitigate these things and there are other minds in the world in which you know there are these standards and um and that and those minds are uh you know those mines function fine and they don't have to shut down because they're not because they're so expensive or whatever it is. So I think that I I think that pee if people can kind of like take those standards and and create something that that can be applied across the board that will help. And then finally and I think most importantly is again the Glencore mine I went to the guy I spoke to the he was the at that time he was the CEO of the mine or whatever it was I think he was CEO of the mine and he said look we are Australian guy Clint Donc lovely guy and he said look we're paying five hundred million dollars this year in taxes and you know and then I looked at the figures for the next year 1.2 billion dollars for the for for both Glencore mines together where d where does that money go? I mean I understand that the I understand that the the country needs to you know that there are there are it's a huge country and it needs to spend money on infrastructure but and so on. But I mean like once you leave the mine site where there's a proper road and you know there's there's so on and so forth you know the the road runs out and it's falling to pieces and and there are people scraping by and you know there are people people can't send their kids to school and so on. I mean it's just it's really it's it's quite stark. But under the mining codes of 2002 and 2018 Congo does have a very specific set of laws and they have a specific way that the that the that the mining um revenues are are redistributed. But the problem is that they get centralized in Kinshasa and then those monies disappear and only a few people have managed to figure out ways of getting them back to local communities. And and I talk in the end of the book I talk about the case of Bunker which is a um a mining community oh sorry is a uh is a community um which is kind of governed by the great descendant um great great great grandson of of King Siri and he managed to get some of the mining revenues back and build a university and a radio station and invest in farming and agriculture and so on.

SPEAKER_00

So if we look at it today it's less the story of uh raw capitalist extraction from foreign companies but more the strength of the institutions within the Congo itself to actually distribute the taxable income that they are receiving.

SPEAKER_01

I would say it's a combination of of the both I don't think that I think that there is there is definitely this this this extractive thing going on and and when you look at some of the artisanal mining practices which can be up to twenty percent of uh cobalt production in any year that is very very um you know that is that that is very extractive and that is very you know you know there's a there's a black market and there are these you know if you look at the case of Huayu um and their um subsidiary C DM I mean that They're buying they're buying minerals off, you know, they're buying minerals off people who are coming from mine sites that they have absolutely no oversight of. Um and that company unto until last year was an Apple supply chain. I mean, that's the crazy thing about it.

SPEAKER_00

There's a number in the book which I wrote down just trying to pick it out now, because it was shocking. And that's sort of what I was coming to with the arc of that question, which is the problem seems to be really in the artisanal nature of the mining and the informal communities that build up around it, and just how it's strongman really will take as much as they can from that. Um but it was the figure that I had in mind.

SPEAKER_01

But it's but it's the thing the thing that the thing that okay, yes, industrial mining and artisanal mining exist and and there are industrial miners who do better and so on, but it's all part of the same system and it's part of this like political system as well. So I I wouldn't let all the industrial miners off the hook entirely. Just I'm just like I'm just very aware that, you know, other other stories have said, oh well, uh other people have said, oh well, they're mixing artisanal supply with industrial supply. There is so much cobalt there that they don't need to in to mix industrial supply with artisanal supply. But I think that the problem is the problem is much more systemic. And I and I think that that's that's really what you have to look at, the systemic nature of this problem. And how do what do you explain that systemic nature to be? I think corruption is is the is the basic is is the one-word answer to that question.

SPEAKER_00

Aaron Powell If you look at say why nations fail or something like that, and inclusive extractionary institutions determines whether a nation fails or doesn't. Um if you take that thesis for granted, the only solution would be more inclusive institutions, therefore more accountable institutions. Um but how does one actually move towards that? And especially given the case that the Congo is still growing?

SPEAKER_01

I mean I I I think you're you're you're completely right. Uh I think it has to start with I think it I think that the simple answer to that is the rule of law, and I think a good start is free and fair elections.

SPEAKER_00

Um you're still banned from the Congo? Yeah, last I checked. Any any chance that that can be overturned? Would you risk it flying in there?

SPEAKER_01

Uh I think under the current government, um I don't think it would make much sense. Good deal. Okay. And do you know if you're not going to be able to do it? I don't know if it didn't get on the planes.

SPEAKER_00

Do you know if your book will be published in the Congo?

SPEAKER_01

Question.

SPEAKER_00

I uh at the moment there's there's not a French translation, so so we've got to work on that. You were speaking to one of the politicians of one of the mining districts, a Congolese politician, and he boasted that the Congo is the Saudi Arabia of cobalt. And no matter which way you disassemble the EV transition at the economy, the Congo and its resources are always going to be your central character. So I just wondered whether you got a sense for how the Congolese, because you profile so many people within the book, particularly the miners and themselves and some of the politicians. Do they have a sense for how fixated a certain segment of the world's attention is on them?

SPEAKER_01

I think so. I think they might even think they might even have more of a sense than you know, your your person, your average person on the street here in in the US because it it it's very funny because people there will have a really good understanding of of uh of this type of um you know this type type of uh extractionary extractionary um sort of uh attitude um and you know people in New York or in London or whatever might not have heard of heard of the DRC.

SPEAKER_00

Who was one person that you profiled in the book that really lives with you?

SPEAKER_01

Hmm. It's a good question. I I mean I think they all live with me. I think because I spent the most time with him, Odilon Kajumba Kilanga, uh who is who is in many ways the kind of main story that takes you through at least the first part of the book. Um uh hi he, you know, I think about him a lot. Um and um, you know, he's somebody who I stay in touch with through in intermediaries in in Congo and so on, so I check in on him. And and what's amazing about him is that he sort of has really tried to get out of the cycle of artisanal mining that's been really difficult for him. And you know, he tried to start a restaurant, and then he tried to go and work at Ivanhoe, and then he tried to start and do, you know, he tried to to do things that were kind of within the kind of formal uh part of um you know the formal order of things. You know, I think about him, I think about his kids and so on. You know, uh other people that I uh other people that I think of uh, you know, uh there's a child miner called Zeki who was 15. You know, there were there were a bunch of bunch of kids who I spoke to who um, you know, um there was another kid called André who was a kind of amazing like salesman type, and he he actually had become the boss of these other children and had like was leading them into the mines, and then he got convinced to go out of the mines, and then his other children who were around him came out of the mines with him and so on, and he was a kind of amazing kid. I I I wonder how he is. So all of these people's stories they stay with you, and I think that you know, because you know you spend time with them as a writer, and because you listen to their interviews over and over again, and because you have done these long conversations with them. I mean, I think that that, you know, they sort of and and you've written about them, you know, you that that that sort of lives in your in your in your mind quite strongly.

SPEAKER_00

How responsible do you feel getting their story out there and well known as an archetypal representation of what's happened?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I feel very very responsible. Um I I feel like um, you know, somebody coming to you and doing an interview gives you a certain, you know, they give you a certain level of trust. Um and the trust is that you're gonna go out and tell the story. Um so yeah, I feel very responsible. Um and especially the people who ended up in prison um, you know, for very bad reasons. Um, especially Patrick uh Masenko Kalasa, uh, who remains in prison for uh writing out a manifesto essentially, um uh talking about how the wealth was being stolen by politicians in Kinshasa. Um you know that to me, that to me, I think you you have a kind of responsibility to tell those stories when once you've been given them.

SPEAKER_00

When you talk about how filthy the cobalt supply chain is, is it taking into account the corruption and the misallocation of the resources, or are you particularly thinking about actually the sheer conditions of the artisanal mining and the fact that it is pits with the fine grain that's going into their lungs and just wearing flip-flops and the sheer lack of safety around the whole thing?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I mean I think both and corruption, uh uh toxic toxic exposure, working for long hours in these hot, dark tunnels um that are liable to collapse. You know, just uh it it it's a rotten system. I mean, I I mean, like and and and it doesn't serve anybody that it exists like that. It it maybe it serves a couple of corrupt people here and there, but you know, if you were designing a world in which, you know, you were the only person to reap the benefits, and if you were completely cynical, there's no but there's no way that you would design design something to that that was this m mindlessly cruel and mindlessly obscure. I mean it's just it i it it's it's a system that has developed because of history and because of a lot of bad decisions that have been made along the way. Um and it's a system that could be could be cleaned up pretty easily. I mean I d I I don't think I don't think I don't think I I'm under no illusions that it has to be like this. And I think that there's a very cynical reaction to this book, um, which, you know, you could you could take, which is just that um that that you know this is the way that kind of capitalism is and and you know you can't change it and so on. I I'm I mean w why does it have to be like this? Is this there's there's no there's no real logic to to any of these things. The artisanal mining was a sort of failed policy to develop a middle class um by by the Kabila government, by the first Kabila government. Um surely it would be much better to just uh figure out a way of you know actually working with these people to have better lives instead of instead of instead of sending them down these mines with zero protective equipment, zero shoes, blah blah blah blah blah.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, it is pretty defeatist to just conclude that this is capitalism functioning as it should be. Um because it doesn't seem to be the case when next door you have mines like Glencore, the one that you just spoke about, which is operating with all the appropriate safety requirements and paying $500 million in tax. Um that's maybe closer to the form of capitalism that you'd like to see. Um but if we just continue I don't want to be a peerleader for Glencore, I'm just saying like if they if they go to the United States. Because the Congo has this whether you call it a miracle or luck or bad luck of history, that it happens to just have geographically the great majority of the cobalt available. You also go to Indonesia, but you're right that the great majority is in the Congo. And we are pretty determined to electrify the economy for a lot of good reasons. Are you just afraid that this negative externality will just be continually pushed over there into the Congo? And as long as the resource keeps coming, there won't be too much of an appetite to intervene?

SPEAKER_01

I think for some people, yes, that there's it would be very convenient for you know for people in big tech companies if people didn't ask these questions for sure. But one of the things actually is that cobalt is becoming very expensive and there's demand and so on. So there's been a move away from cobalt, there's been a move to recycle cobalt and so on. Uh but don't forget that that cobalt is kind of is very important, but copper is just as important for for for Congo. So so that uh and and and if it's not copper, if it's not cobalt, then it's other things like coal tan, gold, tantalum, tungsten, diamonds, lithium sink. Logging and lithium, of course, lithium, um, at a certain point, although lithium prices have crashed because of because of oversupply recently and and a lack of demand. Um but yeah, over the long term, you know, things could things could remain the same, and uh as as you say, population pressures um in Kinshasa and around the rest of the country could really could really um lead the country into a devastating situation.

SPEAKER_00

What did you make of Sid Hathkara's Cobalt Red, which made a huge splash a few years ago when it came out?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I mean I think it was it was a book that came at a um specific time and it was it was important in drawing interest and awareness to this subject. Yeah, and you know, there are some there are you know the I I I think that this my my book is is a is a much more zoomed out version of that. Of course, we like we get up close and personal with with artisanal miners. Cobalt Red is really focused on artisanal mining and and and um it's in the horrors it's yeah, the horrors of artisanal mining and and and and specifically um you know what what's happening on that front.

SPEAKER_00

But I think that you know um there are other things to consider in the system in of the of the DRC. Okay, so at the beginning, I the very beginning, before we recorded, I hinted at maybe an arc that I wanted to take the interview through. And a part of it was this the biggest dislocation between demand and supply, which I thought was um quite a which I enjoyed reading it. This was also in the in the afterlogue, the prologue, whatever it's called. Um The epilogue, exactly. So you're right that we're entering the largest demand supply dislocation in human history, driven by electrification, batteries, AI, and reindustrialization. What does that actually mean for the physical world? For mines, ports, shipping lanes, and therefore countries like the Congo?

SPEAKER_01

It means that mining is going to have to to be ramped up if we want to meet decarbonisation goals. Um there are two way everything around us comes from from two things, agriculture or mining. Um and you know, mining is taking things out of the ground, agriculture is growing things. Um and uh once you look at things uh that way, um you realize that um you know electrification and batteries is predicated on a lot more things. You need to have a lot more metals, a lot more um a lot more minerals. Um and those things need to come from somewhere and and and and that's where the dislocation is happening.

SPEAKER_00

Why did you decide to write that in the uh afterward for the book? Since it was a point that was being made the entire time? You know, like what's the particular message you wanted to send from that?

SPEAKER_01

Because I think that this is only going to continue and it is only going to grow in scope. Um and I think that there's a tendency for readers to read something and feel like something has been done about it. But my message is that this is not just gonna go away. This is not just something that you can like click on your phone or like sign a petition and then forget about it. I mean, it's it will be a topic that will be more and more central to our lives. I mean, we're seeing these resource wars playing out. We're seeing um, you know, Trump going to Venezuela to to take the oil, as he says, Trump going to Greenland to take, you know, not just not just to take a geostrategic base, but also to take critical metals. Um, you know, Trump um doing these things in order to in order to have access to resources and and uh other countries doing the same thing. Um the UAE, you know, building a a network of uh you know uh got a gold network all over um Africa, also uh you know, sponsoring um uh a support force in Sudan, um uh the rapid support force in Sudan in order to take over golden agriculture. I mean it's you know there's it's not just it's not just the US. I mean I think it's it it's this very, very competitive world and this competitive world in which raw materials are the price.

SPEAKER_00

And do you think like uh this is a cynical response, but generally our ethics are sliding backwards a little bit and we're becoming more and more comfortable with just happily parking the externality elsewhere as long as we don't have to see it ourselves?

SPEAKER_01

Yep, 100%. I think we've been comfortable with that for a very long time, and we like to kid ourselves that it was otherwise, but um but it's actually but it's it's people are comfortable with that um when it comes down to it. And um, you know, the Chinese might talk about greening their cities and so on, um, but what they are doing, especially in Indonesia, is moving production from sorry, pollution from one part of the the world to another. And um I think that that type of mentality discounts the global nature of climate change and global warming. So um so I think that that that that's very important to note. But also, you know, is is just devastating when you think about uh local communities, indigenous communities that are being affected by these kinds of things.

SPEAKER_00

This becomes a bit of a sociological question, so I don't expect you to have the perfect answer for it. But how do you explain that ethical slide?

SPEAKER_01

I think I've I've been thinking of uh quite a lot about this. I think if people are afraid, they'll accept things more. Um, you know, I think that if you tell people that your neighbour is part of an evil race and he's gonna come and rape your daughters, you're gonna kind of be okay if you know a gang of people come with machetes and and and chop him up, and you know, that's what you saw in the Roman genocide. Um, you know, and I think that people around the world are more scared these days. They're more scared of adversaries. We're in a heightened sense of you know, geopolitical fear, and it's and it's uh unfortunately this kind of downward spiral in which everybody's trying to be king of the world. But do they really want to be king of the world when the world is completely ruined and and and you know just devastated? I totally agree with you. I think it's you know, we've we've descended into darkness and hopefully hopefully we can we can climb back out of it, then let's see, let's see where things go.

SPEAKER_00

Thematically consistent with the discussion on the Congo. Yeah, well do you do you hate that cliche, the heart of darkness? How much do you think? Yeah, I kind of do.

SPEAKER_01

I just I mean I think look Conrad was trying to talk about the heart of darkness at the heart of every man, and it became that like Congo was the heart of darkness because like it was this dark, you know uh d I think what con what Conrad was trying trying to say is that at the heart of uh in in everybody's in everybody's deepest, darkest part of their soul, um there there lies the capacity to do terrible things and um and you know th without a sense of structure in a in a place in which order has totally broken down, um that that that that that heart of darkness can be awake awakened. It's not sort of trying to say that like Congo is morally a dark, evil place, and this is where evil things can happen.

SPEAKER_00

Uh the Congo is the central character of the book, but Indonesia does feature briefly as well. How optimistic are you for its future?

SPEAKER_01

I don't know Indonesia that well. I feel like moving the capital Jakarta to um to some island Kalimantan and to Borneo is I forget. I find that North Northeast. It's Cal it's Kalimantan, I think. I think that's I mean, I think that's bonkers. I mean Jakarta's such a big city. You know, it's a it it it's an interesting country. It's a very, very undercovered uh country, at least here in the US. Um and um and it's a place that I enjoyed going to. But it is a place in you know, I'm much more optimistic about what's happening in Indonesia compared to Congo because, you know, while there is corruption and so on, there is to some ext there is there is a strong sense of of development and you know rule of law and so on, um uh even though that is abrogated in many instances and so on. In Congo, you know, it's the rule of the ruling family at the moment, and it's just like that's that's that's really um complex.

SPEAKER_00

What is something you wanted to talk about or that I missed that's critically important to understanding this book?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I mean I think the book has has many different parts and um you know it's it and and was was soft criticized in the in in in a in a review uh recently for this. Um and what I'm trying to show by the end of the book is just how interconnected all these things are and and and and it and um and and hopefully it's hopefully it's it's it's it's pacey and and and and lets you look into lots of different worlds by the end. Um but yeah, you know, it takes you from from Congo to the Western Sahara to Indonesia to you know boardrooms in China to to uh you know to to Tesla factories in Germany. So it's it kind of gives you it gives you a Lot of view of this as a global system, as a system that was not necessarily chosen, and it's for that reason that I started the book with a quote by the late um uh sort of uh Heideggero Marxist philosopher um uh Costas Axelos Um uh who talks about um the techno-scientific setup of the world which is this kind of this system that we haven't even really chosen which we haven't really designed but has just been but just kind of creates creates its own logic and and things happen without moral um without a kind of moral basis without a without a without a kind of um uh even even a capitalist logic. They happen because they are inscribed in this techno-scientific order.

SPEAKER_00

And let me let me read the quote.

SPEAKER_01

The book is here, the game of the world.

SPEAKER_00

Who will get there first? Alright, I got it here. Can I read it, Nick? Absolutely, go for it. Costas Axelos. Is he a countryman of yours? He is, yeah, that's what he is. Within the techno-scientific setup that seizes the world, there is no longer the sovereign good, nor even the happiness of humanity. It's well-being and comfort. Well, that's true. Humans have and will have to live and die without comprehending what is happening, why it is happening, or how it is happening.

SPEAKER_01

So hopefully this is a little bit of a window into how it is happening, where it is happening, and why it is happening. But um but let's but but uh you know that's that the that's the idea behind the book. I don't think it's it's in any way a complete work um because what you brush up against doing something like this is is the s you start sort of feeling this kind of elephant um which is which is history, and then you're like, oh god, I don't want to tell the history of the world through battery metals.

SPEAKER_00

Well, look, that uh that um that energy which that quote gave definitely does ring true through the book. I've anticipated ever since you uh sort of first told me about it, but I am definitely some sort of outlier with uh niche and eclectic enough of interests to be definitely interested in it. But I thought it was a good compliment to something like Ed Conway's um material world as well. You know, where where that is definitely just the hardcore science and geographical history of these materials and how they contribute to the supply chain. But then you've also got the socio-political element on top of it as well. Actually, what do humans do once they start interacting with these materials and can start building on top of it? How does that affect society and all those involved? That's definitely a good place to leave it, but I have just remembered one question which I definitely wanted to ask, so I can cut this in at another point. But you spend quite a bit of time in the book as well talking about the battery technology itself, some of the scientists behind the discoveries and how that has evolved. And the lithium-ion battery is currently the best iteration of the battery technology we have. But there's also a world, I imagine, where just some researcher somewhere around the world is going to come up with a significantly better technology which may no longer even require the use of cobalt whatsoever. And I fear, not I fear, but I think that that kind of tends to be a theme a lot of the time where we make all these plans and commitments and work towards optimizing the supply chain, the the um um the rights of those on the ground, the conditions that they're working in, and so forth to make sure that it's as good as possible. But then a new technology just comes around and that's all left in the in the wayside.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, you know, um, I mean lithium ion phosphate, which is a technology I talk talk about in the book, is a it is a technology without without cobalt. You know, there are low cobalt technologies, there are other no-cobalt technologies, there's sodium ion batteries, which don't give as much power, but they're you know, they can be they can be optimized for electric cars. Um But the question I have to ask for this is if we know cobalt works, and it and if we know that cobalt works really well for small devices like laptops and cell phones and so on, and if we know that it works really well for high performance cars, and if we know it works really well for you know buses or whatever it is, why aren't we using it? Why why aren't we just figuring out a good way of getting it out of the ground, a good non-polluting way of get getting it out of the ground? Like why do we have to why do we have to rely on these supply chains that are just like insane? It doesn't do anybody any good to have um children mining um it doesn't have anything it doesn't do anybody good to have women washing radioactive materials. And in fact, this is a very um, you know, for the Congolese government, this is a very uh unproductive way of doing things. Um so what I would say is that um the question is not should we change the technology or not should we only use cobalt that's recycled, although that would be great. Um I think that's very, very far off because it would require tons of people to recycle and you know demand would have to be solid and so on. But um but uh the um the situation uh in Congo can be materially improved pretty pretty quickly if people you know if there was a political will and the will from corporations um and international bodies of course. Um so I um I am sceptical that the idea is to just ban Congolese cobalt or to move away from move away from cobalt in the supply chain and so on. I I I think it it works, it's a it's a good technology. The technology is, you know, um you know can be refined further and so on. But why why go and look for something else and spend all that energy um and and uh and and and then leave Congolese people with a mineral that's worth nothing? I I think that's that's really interesting. That that's really the point. That's really one one point that I'm trying to make. And the second point that I'm trying to make with bringing the Western Sahara in for lithium-ion phosphate, you know, lithium-ion phosphate people think is this uncomplicated technology. I mean, you see it on Twitter, like whenever I tweet about the book, or even even in the even in the comments to reviews and stuff, it's like, well, you know, every everybody uses lithium ion phosphate now anyway. Okay, firstly, that's not true. I mean, it's like around half of half of the electric vehicle batteries these days are LFP, uh, depending which country you're in. I think US still has a slightly higher performance uh uh proportion of nickel manganese cobalt or or or nickel aluminium uh sorry um uh aluminium cobalt um cathodes. Um but uh but but certainly you know the technology has been refined and so on and so forth. Um I would say that if you look at LFP, I mean part of that supply chain is the Western Sahara. It's the it's the last colony in Africa, it is a place in which human rights are abrogated by the Moroccan government. Um and so this idea that phosphate, which by the way, is when phosphate runs out, Isaac Asimov put it very well, human life on this planet will end, you know we're using that finite resource, which comes from a complicated place as well. It doesn't make me feel any better about myself, I have to say. So I guess the second point of it uh that I would make is that there's no free lunch.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Uh final question. I asked you last time about generally the role that serendipity had played in your life, but I wanted to ask specifically about this book, that same question. Uh where where did serendipity introduce you to um a better story or a different story, something you hadn't thought of before when putting it together?

SPEAKER_01

I can't remember the film, so I was gonna make a joke about it, but but uh but um but it's not the nineties anymore, I guess. Um was that the early 2000s? Um no, serendipity putting it together. You know, look, I was very lucky to find um so to get a call in 2017 or whenever it was uh from an amazing agent, Adam Eaglin, at Cheney Agency, saying, Look, I'd be interested in working with you on a book, um, a book proposal. Um I was very lucky to meet uh Will Haywood, my my editor at Penguin, who has been an incredible supporter, not only when I was in prison, um, but also, you know, through the entire editorial process and his team there um has been incredible. Um and uh I have been lucky to meet the right people along the way. You know, I arrived in Congo with a phone number for a um for a translator, and through him I met another guide and translator, Jeff Kazadi, and he has been um you know he has been there you know advising me and we've become good friends and you know um he came and visited me in Paris recently and and uh you know he's uh he's a he he's been an important person. But then you know, there's been all these kind of other little moments of of uh of uh serendipity or luck or I don't know. We had a there was a moment where we were um where we were on the road to Bunker, which is which is that town that I was talking about next to uh which which Monsieur was from, and um the the the car suddenly lost traction and we were skidding around and we came right up to a sort of ditch with a market stall behind it. And you know, had we gone one metre further we would have sort of flipped into the ditch and probably careened into the market stall. So um so very, very lucky there. Um and yeah, just like being in, you know, suddenly you're you're in Kolwese and you say, Look, I'd like to go to this mine, and suddenly you're sit sitting next to the person who runs the Oh sorry, this was in Monono at the lithium mine. I walked into the lithium capital of Congo and I w and I really need to get something to eat. And luckily the head of the mine was sitting right there having a conversation. I said, I hadn't heard Australian guy as well, very, very nice chap called Mick Brown, and he was chatting away with with one of his colleagues, and he said he said, um, okay, let you know, let's have a beer, and we had a we had a nice chat. He said, Okay, come and come and have a look at the mine on on Saturday or whatever it was. And um and so yes, that was a moment of serendipity for sure. Because and I said, Do you usually go to that restaurant? So, well, you know, not that much, but like I'm coming to my the my the end of my um my shift, not my shift, but uh my uh my period that I'm here so um you know we decided to go out for lunch, so there you go.

SPEAKER_00

Unbelievable. I love it. Thank you so much, Nick, and thank you again for being so generous with your time. Anytime, Ryan. Great to speak with you and um wishing you all the best. Cheers, mate.