A pocket guide to Glencore, a UK-Swiss mining company with a toxic global footprint, and how you can support the resistance.
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A pocket guide to Glencore, a UK-Swiss mining company with a toxic global footprint, and how you can support the resistance.
DE The Agua Rica project is unviable, not only because of the pollution it would cause to the water, soil, and air in the region, but also because of the risk of landslides on the town and the direct attack on the glacial and periglacial environment of the Nevado del Aconquija.
Argentina has passed a reform weakening glacier protections, while mining companies face investigation for lobbying to access glacier-protected areas.
DAL CUE GE copper, gold, siver & molybdenum
COMMUNITY // Andalgalá, in the Catamarca province. For 25 years, the people of Andalgalá have fought in the streets and courts against mining in the Nevado del Aconquija, home to a glacier, the source of their rivers, and a vital water supply.
MINE // Agua Rica project (MARA company)
is an open-pit mega-mining project in Nevado del Aconquija acquired by Glencore in 2023.
MARA- AguaRica has no social license!
// bauxite
COMMUNITY // Oriximiná, Terra Santa, and Faro in Pará state.
MINE // Novas Minas project, a new joint venture between Glencore, Rio Tinto and Brazil's largest bauxite producer Mineracao Rio do Norte (MRN).
The MRN mine, located along the Trombetas River, has had severe impacts on traditional Quilombola and Ribeirinho communities. It has disrupted their livelihoods by cutting off access to the forest and waterways that once provided food and essential materials. Communities also face ongoing fear of environmental disaster from potential tailings dam failures and altered river flows.
The company fails to recognise many of these traditional riverside communities
― effectively treating them as if they do not exist.
Tabaco, La Guajira Department.
MINE // Cerrejón, founded in 1976 is Latin America's largest coal mine.
The Cerrejón mine has displaced over 35 Wayúu and Afro-descendant communities, from the violent eviction of Tabaco to the forced relocation of many others. It has devastated local livelihoods, destroyed dry forest, and contributes to climate change.
MINGA POR LA VIDA Y LA PERMANENCIA EN EL TERRITORIO TABACO RESISTE CON DIGNIDAD
Glencore continues to expand by diverting the Bruno River and filing four multi-million dollar Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) claims against Colombia linked to its operations in Cesar and La Guajira.
The long-standing resistance of La Guajira continues today, and an example is Tabaco where the community has blockaded the railway, asking for the reconstruction of their town.
IS THE AMB DO STOP THE GENOCIDE
NFANTCIDE FEMIGIDE
In November 2024 Colombia issued a decree banning coal exports to Israel. "Colombian coal is used to make bombs to kill Palestinian children" - Gustavo Petro, August 2024
Prior to the embargo 41% of Israel's coal supply came from Colombia, with Glencore a key provider. Meanwhile South Africa has gone from providing 11% of Israel's coal imports to a staggering 88%.
South Africa has placed evidence of genocide before the International Court of Justice, yet continues to export Glencore's coal to Israel, fuelling brutal- ity against Palestinians.
IMPACTS cobalt.
AIR AND LAND POLLUTION // Contamination of agricultural land, respiratory diseases.
WATER POLLUTION // Discharges of contaminated industrial wastewater and high concentrations of copper and DISPLACEMENT AND HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSES // Communities have lost land and livelihoods, child and forced labour in mines, violence against human rights defenders.
CONGO // cobalt + copper Glencore has been operating in the DRC since 2007, through Kamoto Copper Company (KCC) and Mutanda Mining (MUMI) in the Lualaba province.
CAT
COMMUNITY // Puerto Huarmey, a fishing town in the Ancash region.
MINE // Antamina, located in the Andean mountains, is one of the world's largest copper/zinc mines a joint venture of BHP, Glencore, Teck Resources and Mitsubishi Corporation.
STOLEN LIVELIHOODS // Waste water discharged into the forest of Huarmey depleting fish population.
PUBLIC HEALTH CRISIS // Health impacts from heavy metal poisoning as a result of mining operations.
DESVIO
MUERTE
Copper is the second most widely used material by the US Department of War and is crucial to the Al boom. Mining corporations have claimed the world will need to extract 700 million tonnes of copper in the next 20 years, "as much copper as humans have produced in a hundred thousand years of our history".
LA BASTA DE DICTADURA MINERA FUERA HARA
NI LA CARCEL. NI LA MUERTE DETENDRAN LA LUCHA DEL PUEBLO, ANDALGALA RESISTE..! "MEGA MINERIA DELITO DE LESA HUMANIDAD"
Algarrobo LUCHAR X LA VIDA, ES LUCHAR X LA LIBERTAD.
El Glencore's toxic impact is meeting global resistance. Communities around the world are rising up to demand justice, accountability, reparations, and an end to extractivist projects that destroy nature, culture and livelihoods.
Hear directly from communities resisting Glencore in Argentina, Peru, Brazil, DRC and Colombia in this video london mining network
Turn the page and support the global resistance to Glencore
RESISTANCE TO GLENCORE
As Glencore's mining frontier expands under the banner of the energy transition and the search for critical minerals, the communities make evident that this comes at a profound cost-undermining people's health and cultures and driving the destruction of ecosystems in extraction zones. This is not a solution for the ecological crises.
Glencore has been named as one of the key companies complicit in Israel's economy of genocide
- United Nations report, 'From Economy of Occupation to Economy of Genocide', July 2025
"Every Saturday the community in Andalgalá hold a protest walk opposing the Agua Rica project which threatens their glaciers and water sources. "We will continue to resist Glencore's MARA Agua Rica -Alumbrera project until justice is done."
"We are trying to preserve the lungs of the earth. Please help us protect our communities - we are the ones protecting all of you. Do not just protect rivers, animals and nature. Protect us because we are the people living in the forest. We are the people who are protecting nature itself."
- Silvia Rocha, member of Quilombola communities affected by mining in the Brazilian Amazon
The UK-Swiss mining giant Glencore describes itself as a vertically- integrated natural resource company, meaning that it is involved at every stage of the supply chain of its products, from extraction and processing through to marketing and trading. Its operations include metals particularly copper, nickel and cobalt - as well as coal, oil, gas, and agricultural products. Operating in over 35 countries Glencore is one of the world's largest mining companies, in 2025 reporting revenue of $247.5 billion - up 7 percent year-on-year.
TABALO RESISTE Cerrejon Incumple
Glencore Rebuild Tabaco now! Stop ISDS against Colombia! "We have done everything that is in our hands to stop mining companies from settling here... 50 years later, we continue to resist... We would like you, the international community, to join our struggles, to join our march... and support us so that we can continue."
- José Julio Perez, member of the Tabaco community affected by the Cerrejón coal mine
Glencore shrouds its operations in secrecy, and for good reason: the details painstakingly brought to light by community activists and environmental justice campaigners paint a damning picture. From the bribery scandals in the DRC, the murder of anti-mining activists in the Philippines, the poisoning of water supplies in Peru, and the abuse of workers in its mines the world over, we can see that whilst Glencore's operations might be diverse, the common thread that ties them together is an exploitative business model based on crossing ethical lines in the pursuit of ever greater profits.
The SA BDS Coalition is calling on civil society to be loud and vocal about the need to block coal exports to Israel and impose an energy embargo: join protests, write to your representatives, and reach out to the SA BDS Coalition if you are able to provide support.
Read their report:
With the US-Israel war on Iran raising costs but boosting commodity prices Glencore has said its trading division could beat a long-term earnings target this year.
- The Wall Street Journal, April 2026
PERU // copper
Communities in Puerto Huarmey are demanding that the Peruvian government declares an environ- mental emergency over mining pollution in the area. They call on international health institutions to give urgent medical attention to children and pregnant women affected by arsenic contamination.
Communities are taking action to provide support for families severely affected by poverty around Glencore's mining sites, and develop a roadmap for continuous resistance against Glencore and for the protection of Indigenous peoples' rights.
Sign this petition to stop Glencore in the DRC:
GLOBAL RESISTANCE TO GLENCORE