Much of the talk at Roskill’s Tantalum 2018 conference, held in London last week, was focussed on industry efforts to improve responsible sourcing of raw material tantalum. It was made clear by several speakers that tantalum is still very much a conflict mineral, defined as ‘minerals mined in conditions of armed conflict and human rights abuses, and which are sold or traded by armed groups’. Dr Elizabeth Orlando of the US Department of State explained how tantalum is also on the US 2018 critical minerals list because of supply chain instability and the importance of tantalum in applications such as capacitors for electronic devices.

Roskill comments that “the industry is working hard to remove conflict minerals completely from the tantalum supply chain. Programs in Europe and the USA are working on the ground in the DRC to database regional deposits and to make sure that material is tagged and checked throughout the manufacturing chain to ensure transparency. At the same time, they are educating customers and encouraging downstream responsibility. Delegates at the Roskill conference also heard about new techniques which could be adopted such as blockchain technology, which is already being used in the diamond mining industry.”