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IBM 420 - international business coursework
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Title: The Avarice Multinational Corporation in Violation the Environment
Introduction
In 21st Century, environment quality has become poor and poorer due to the
greediness and carelessness in safety of the Multinational Corporation (MNC) in
violation our environment and exploit it for their profitability motif. Most of the MNCs
that involved are normally foreign company which invested in third world or
developing countries. Normally the company from developed countries will try to
exploits on the loosen enforcement of environment law by the related country. In this
mater, ethical and social responsibilities are important roles that all MNCs should
practise wherever they are operates. Since environments are very important to all
countries and everybody, the MNC should have an ethical behaviour and social
responsibility in taking cares the environment by ensuring the operations are more to
environmental friendly.
The ethical dilemmas which are situation that will often involve an apparent
conflict between moral imperatives, in order to obey one would result in
transgressing another. Its what lack with the MNC that greedily explore the
environments for own benefits and, less of ssocial responsibility in which it is an
ethical or ideological theory that an entity whether it is a government, corporation,
organization or individual has a responsibility to society but this responsibility can be
"negative." In that it is a responsibility to refrain from acting (resistance stance) or it
can be "positive," meaning there is a responsibility to act (proactive stance).
However some companies, governments, and international organizations have made
progress toward the impact of commercial activities to environment.
Mining is the excavation of useful minerals that come from within the earth,
usually found in ore bodies, veins, or coal seams. Mining can be carried out almost
anywhere, from 4,000 metres above or below sea level. Mining can happen in a lot
of different places, from tropic jungles to the Arctic. Exploring for them, digging out
of the ground and selling them are requires sacrifices on the natural environment,
wildlife and fish that live on it, and from the Aboriginal people who depend on it. Then
it come with water pollution, negative impact to communities, and abandoned mine.
Consistently, the mining industry has been statistically proven to be one of the
most environmentally destructive industries on the planet. For example, in the
Appalachia region, mountaintop coal removal destroyed, in just ten years, 1,208
miles of streams and 380,547 acres of forest. With far-reaching effects that damage
the land, air, and water, in addition to the plants and animals that live there, the
mining industry is an ecological disaster. The many different types of mines harm
the environment in many different ways. In addition to their impact on the
environment, mines are infamous for how hazardous they are.
Since 1940, there have been over 7000 mining related deaths and an
astounding 488,000 injuries on-the-job, in the US alone. Pompous head executives
of mining companies “claim” that they are being as environmentally-friendly as
possible, but most of the time they are still doing things that harm the environment
one way or another. It is impossible to eliminate all effects on the environment, but
mining companies should be paying more attention to reducing the effect, since
mining is so harsh on the environment. They should look at all different aspects (air,
water, land, etc.), and plan a way of reducing for each section. If reduction is
impossible, they should not go on with the mine. They should also keep in mind the
effects of the mine even after operations within it stop. When it is not absolutely
necessary to mine something, it should not be mined. After all, mining is non-
renewable, so once we take out the minerals, they will never be there again.
Diamond Mining by De Beers
De Beers is strong name in jewellery industries. De Beers and the various
companies within the De Beers Family of Companies engage in exploration for
diamonds, diamond mining, diamond trading and industrial diamond manufacture.
De Beers is active in every category of industrial diamond mining such as open-pit,
underground, large-scales alluvial, coastal and deep sea. Its mining activities take
place in Botswana, Namibia, South Africa and Canada. While it retail gallery can be
found at every Capital of countries. In 2008, De Beers’s financial statement shown
sales revenue amounted USD$6.89 billion and profit before tax USD$1.2 billion.
De Beers Exploration, Mining and Sales
The activity by De Beers has impact on land. All stages of the mining process
can result in the disturbance of the land surface and the eco-systems which it
supports, as well as the aquatic eco-systems into which they drain. In the mining
sequence, surface disturbances come not only from the mines themselves
particularly strip mines and open pits, but also from the large areas needed for the
disposal or dumping of mine tailings and waste rock.
In Canada mining area, estimated million hectares have been used for mining
purposes. The mine site should be returned to its “original” condition. Since mine
closure and reclamation is an expensive and lengthy process, mining companies
like De Beers often reclaim the land by constructing pond and wetland by
establishing vegetation over the mine site, while the waste soil remain without any
recovery treatment.
Copper Mining in Zambia
In Zambia, record copper prices of nearly US$8,000 per tonne on the international market
have triggered huge investment in Zambia's copper mines over the last three years, but critics have
said most investors are putting profit above environmental safety. Therefore, mines are coming
under increasing and sustained criticism for repeatedly polluting drinking water
sources in the Copperbelt mining region, the country's economic heartland. Mopani
Copper Mine, which has mining operations in Mufulira town, near the border of the
Democratic Republic of Congo, accidentally discharged polluted water, after a pump
malfunction failed to purify it, into the reticulated water system of a private water
utility company. Nearly 1,000 residents visited local clinics, complaining of abdominal
pains, severe diarrhoea and vomiting. No fatalities were recorded, but the
widespread poisoning prompted residents to take to the streets in protest and police
were called in to calm the demonstrators. Although Mopani Copper Mine - owned
jointly by Canada's First Quantum Minerals, Swiss firm Glencore International and
the Zambian government, through ZCCM Investments Holdings - cited the failure to
purify the water as an accident, others have accused the company of negligence.
The failure of the (mining) company's underground pump to purify the acidic
water should have been avoid able by simply ensuring there was a standby
alternative at all times. But even after it happened, the water utility should have been
able to detect the impurities in the water - it didn't have to take the people to
complain for the two companies to realise the pumped water was polluted.
In 2007, Zambia's biggest mining company, Konkola Copper Mine [KCM],
owned by London-listed Vedanta Resources, caused widespread water pollution
when its acidic effluent entered the Kafue River, the main source of water of about 2
million people in the area. Hundreds of people fell sick after eating fish poisoned by
the polluted water and more than 50 local farmers have taken legal action
demanding compensation from the mining company because their crops withered
and died after being irrigated with water from the river.
Under Zambian law, environmental management is a vital component of
mining and all mining firms are obliged to prepare detailed environmental impact
assessments, indicating how they will mitigate environmental problems such as air
and water pollution. Erring companies face prosecution, fines or the withdrawal of
their operating licenses. KCM had its operating licence suspended for 10 days after
the water pollution episode in 2007, and was instructed to install new environmental
safety measures. The company reportedly lost $26 million during the suspension
period.
Analysts said such actions as closing mines could be counter-productive to
the country's development. Mining contributes up to 80 percent of Zambia's foreign
exchange, although government only charges a 0.6 percent in mineral royalties - the
global norm is 3 percent. Since then, Frederick Bantubonse, director of the Zambia
Chamber of Mines, commented that closing a mine would not be any good to the
Zambia developments. So, the government should just work to ensure such
accidents are minimised. He is also stress that the issue of polluting the water is very
critical and government need to play a role in fighting it. However, they are finding it
extremely difficult to tackle such problems because of lack of funds.
In 2006, according to a survey published by the Blacksmith Institute, a New
York-based organisation monitoring pollution in the developing world, Kabwe, about
150km north of the capital, Lusaka, and home to 300,000 people, is Africa's most
polluted city. It also has the dubious distinction of being ranked as the world's fourth
most polluted site.
Oil Spill in Russia
According to Agence France-Presse (AFP) report on February 26, 2009,
Dmitry Lisitsyn, an environmental activist on Russia's Sakhalin Island, located in the
Pacific Ocean has recalled the day accident happened in January 2009 in Aniva Bay
when over 100 dying birds washed up on this beach, coated in a thick layer of oil and
helplessly flapping their wings. He believes that several thousand birds killed in the
incident. Activists’ fear that the incident happened in January month could be a sign
of things to come on Sakhalin, whose rich oil and gas fields have drawn billions of
dollars' worth of investment in recent years.
The development of Sakhalin's energy industry has brought jobs and
gleaming new business centers to this impoverished piece of Russia that used to be
a prison colony in the 19th century. It also promises to serve energy-hungry Asian
economies, as underlined by the new liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant expected to
send its first cargo to Japan in Mach.
Kim Limanzo, a fisherman from the town of Nogliki in northern Sakhalin,
complains that fish populations have suffered since drilling began at offshore oil and
gas fields nearby, and sometimes the fish tastes like oil.
This situation has worried the locals and environmental activist where oil spill
can be happened from extraction wells, sub-sea pipelines or a major tanker accident
like the Exxon Valdez spill oil in March 1989 in Alaska. In this incident, Exxon
operated tanker hit a reef and released over a quarter of a million barrels of oil into
Alaska’s Prince William Sound. In 2006, the Russian government accused Sakhalin
Energy on built the pipeline of environmental abuses including the endangerment of
salmon spawning area. However, the legal dispute was settled after Russian state-
run energy giant Gasprom bought a majority stake in the consortium which had
previously led by British-Dutch oil major Shell.
Nuclear accident shakes Japan
An irradiated worker is taken to hospital wrapped in a plastic sheet
Japan is facing an unprecedented nuclear emergency after a major uranium
leak. Radiation levels at the Tokaimura nuclear fuel-processing plant in north-east
Japan are 15,000 times higher than normal. The authorities have warned thousands
of residents near the site of the accident to stay indoors and to wash off any rain that
falls on them. "There is a strong possibility that abnormal reactions are continuing
within the facility," Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiromu Nonaka told an emergency news
conference. "There are concerns about radiation in the surrounding areas." He said
that it was very likely that there had been a "criticality incident" at the plant.
Criticality is the point at which a nuclear chain reaction becomes self-
sustaining. "The situation is one our country has never experienced," Mr Nonaka
said. Three workers from the plant have been taken to hospital and hundreds have
been forced to leave their homes. One of the three workers in hospital is reported to
be in a serious condition, suffering from continuous vomiting.
Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi has set up an emergency task force to tackle the
accident. A government request for help from US military forces in Japan for help
was turned down. The US said its forces were not equipped to handle such
accidents.
The cause of the leak - detected at 1035 local time (0135GMT) - was not
immediately known. The state failed to launch neutron-level analysis, and waited for
the results of a village study before realizing criticality was being sustained at around
5:30 p.m., almost seven hours after the accident occurred. The head of the
company's Tokyo office, Makoto Ujihara, said the workers told other staff at the plant
that "they saw a blue flame rising from the fuel" and complained of nausea. "We are
still trying to find what exactly happened but we believe the uranium reached the
critical point", the spokesman for JCO was quoted as saying. Local schools were
ordered to close their windows and keep pupils indoors. The Prime Minister
postponed a cabinet reshuffle planned for Friday because of the accident.
At a distance of two kilometres (1.24 miles) from the accident, radiation was
still 10 times the normal level said Tatsuo Shimada, an official of Ibaraki Prefecture.
Police cordoned off a 6km "forbidden zone" around the uranium processing plant.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said that initial reports suggested a
radiation leak in Japan was not a "major incident," although it was waiting for more
data. Early estimates suggested the incident was serious but would not rank above
three on a seven-level scale of nuclear incidents, said an IAEA spokesman in
Vienna. The environmental organisation Greenpeace criticised the accident as a
symptom of a safety "crisis" in Japan's nuclear industry.
"Today's accident at Tokaimura confirms our fears - the entire safety culture in
Japan is in crisis and the use of dangerous plutonium in reactors here will only
increase the probability of a nuclear catastrophe," Greenpeace International activist
Shaun Burnie said. The organisation pointed out that the accident came just one day
before a UK-flagged ship was expected to deliver 225 kilograms (495 pounds) of
mixed plutonium-uranium oxide (MOX) fuel to a plant in Takahama, central Japan.
About 400 farming families in Tokai and a local farm products company have called
on JCO to pay 686 million yen in compensation, the claimants said Tuesday.
The figure is set to increase as more of the 1,000 farming families in Tokai file
claims, village officials said. Representatives from the company and those of families
producing carrots, Chinese cabbage, rice and sweet potatoes presented the
compensation demand Monday during a visit to the local office of JCO. The farmers
said they are especially concerned about future losses in sales of dried sweet
potatoes, a Tokai specialty shipped during winter. Many families have received
cancellations of orders for their dried sweet potatoes since the accident. Ibaraki is
the third-largest sweet potato-producing prefecture. Its 1997 crop was worth 17.7
billion yen. Tokai's agricultural committee, which compiled the claims, is demanding
steps toward payment by year's end.
Tokaimura was the site of Japan's worst nuclear plant incident in 1997, when
35 workers were contaminated by radiation after a fire at a processing plant was not
extinguished properly and caused an explosion. A series of incidents at Japanese
nuclear power stations in recent years has undermined confidence in the safety of
this form of energy production, says BBC Tokyo correspondent Juliet Hindell.
In July, cooling water leaked from a pipe in the building that houses the
reactor at the Tsuruga nuclear power plant in northern Japan. It took Japan Atomic
Power, the company that operates the plant, 14 hours to shut down operations after
the leak was discovered. Executives in charge of the reactor said radiation from the
leak was 11,500 times the safety limit. The earlier figure given was 250 times the
limit, and the change has sparked accusations of a cover-up.
Disadvantages or dangers if the Companies Continue on the Unethical Practise.
Evidently, the current methods of mining are very harsh on the
environment. To justify how bad some types of mining are, think about the fact that
producing a single gold ring generates 20 tones of mine waste. And where does that
waste go? Into the water, air, land, animals, and even into us. The Earth is a
special place in which many metals and other materials co-exist. These materials
are vital to the well-being of the earth itself, but greedy mining companies insist on
mining the hell out of an area to steal away the minerals, even if they are
unnecessary, such as diamonds.
Pollution on Air: Mining has a great effect on the quality of the air. Since
mines need to blast through rock to get to an ore, dust may be produced in the
process. Coal mines release methane, which contributes to environmental issues
because it is a greenhouse gas. The methane is sometimes captured, but only
where it is economically feasible to do so. Some cooling plants may release ozone-
depleting substances, but the amount released is very small. Non-vegetated or
uncapped tailings dams release dust, and when radioactive elements are found in
the ore, radiation is emitted. Heavy metals, such as sulfur dioxide, may be polluted
into the air by unsafe smelter operations with insufficient safeguards. The gold
mining industry is one of the most destructive industries in the world, because of all
of the toxins that are released into the air. Acid rain and smog are also some side-
effects of mining. Every year, 142 million tons of sulfur dioxide is emitted into the
atmosphere because of smelting. That’s 13% of total global emissions.
The nuclear power plant accident is contributed to critical air pollution when
the radioactive are carry by the air and spread to surrounding areas. This pollution is
much higher because it totally depends on the wind and can spread out many miles
of distance if the radioactive level is high. It is shown in the history of Chernobyl
nuclear power plant disaster.
Effect on Water: Mines use a lot of water, though some of the water is
reusable. Sulfide-containing minerals, when oxidized through contact with air, via
mining, form sulfuric acid. This, when combined with trace elements, negatively
impacts groundwater. This happens from both surface and underground mines.
Another way surface and underground water are affected is through tailings dams
and waste rock heaps, because they are a source of acidic drainage water. Leftover
chemical deposits from explosives are usually toxic, and increase the salinity of mine
water, as well as contaminating it. Groundwater can be directly contaminated
through “in situ” mining, in which a solvent seeps into un-mined rock, leaching
minerals. In the extraction of minerals, some toxins (for example cyanide and
mercury) are used that can permanently pollute the water, making it hard for fishers
to find fish. Spills into oceans and lakes add toxic heavy metals and sulfuric acid into
the environment, which can take ages to fix. Also, Acid Mine Drainage lowers the
pH of the water, making it more acidic.
Damages on Land: There are many environmental concerns about the
effects mining has on the land. Trees need to be cut down in order to have a mine
built, and whole forests could be destroyed. Mining involves moving large quantities
of rock, and in surface mining, overburden land impacts are immense. Overburden
is the material that lies overtop of the desirable mineral deposits that must be
removed before the mining process begins. Some mines make an effort to return
the rock and land to its original appearance by returning the rock and overburden to
the pit that they were taken out of. Copper mines sometimes extract ore that has
very little copper actually in it (less than 1%). Almost all of the mined ore of non-
ferrous metals becomes waste. A lot of areas are pock marked by thousands of
small holes by people digging in search of precious minerals. Mining activities also
may lead to erosion, which is dangerous and bad for the land. It destroys river
banks, and changes how the river flows, where it flows, what lives in it, etc. Toxins
used in the extraction of minerals (for example cyanide and by-products like
mercury) can permanently pollute the land, which makes people not able to farm in
certain places. Open-pit mining leaves behind large craters that can be seen from
outer-space.
Destruction of Ecosystem: Mines are highly damaging to the ecosystems
surrounding them. Many different types of mines affect many different types of
ecosystems. For example, deep-sea mines are at high risk of eliminating rare and
potentially valuable organisms. Mining destroys animal habitats and ecosystems.
Pits that mines create could have been home to some animals. Also, the activity that
surrounds the mine, including people movement, explosions, road construction,
transportation of the goods, the sounds made, etc. are harmful to the ecosystems
and will change the way the animals have to live, because they will have to find a
new way to cope with the mine and live around it. An estimated 30% of total mining
exploration site is for road system. Studies have shown that road significantly affect
animal distribution and fragment animal population. For some species roads are
impassable barriers. Road fragment the population and each isolated population
subject to dissolve. In addition, to direct impact of habitat loss, roads also facilitate
the invasion of exotic species by hunters or jungle trackers. Spills of deadly
substances obviously have a very negative effect on animals and ecosystems in
general. Many of the toxins and tailings that are discharged from the mines can
disrupt and disturb the way animals live, and their health. Mining can completely
destroy ecosystems by adding or taking out something from the animals’ everyday
lives, therefore throwing the whole thing out of balance.
On the spilt of oil in Russia has affected the living animals that not only in the
sea but also to the birds which take fish as their diet. This will harmful the bird when
they swim through the spilt oil and cannot fly when its touch the oil. Many birds and
fishes died due to the oil and this affected sea or areas will take few years to
recover.
In the case on waste of the nuclear power plant, it is very sensitive to the
environment because the radioactive are very dangerous when expose to the
atmosphere or any living thing. Therefore the sensitivity of the wastage are very high
if its expose to the air. If leakage happened the impact are very high to the
environment. Exposure to the radioactive will give a life impact on health to the living
thing for generations.
Safety and Health in Operation: Mining can be very safe, but often it is
extremely dangerous. Underground mining is usually more unsafe than surface
because of the poor ventilation and visibility, as well as the rock fall hazards. The
biggest health risks are from dust, which can cause breathing problems. One
example would be silicosis, which is when silica found in the rock gets into your
lungs, and rip them apart. The silica gets you’re your lungs when you blast the rock
away to find the ore inside, and little fragments of silica arise as dust, which you then
breathe in. Another health issue is from exposure to radiation. People below
poverty line in third-world countries are affected by mining. If the mining
contaminates their fresh water supply, they will have to walk for miles to find more
water.
Nuclear power plant is the higher risk to the environment in the case if
accident happened if no safety or precaution taken during operation and disposal of
the nuclear waste. Since the status or risk are very high that taken place for the
disposal, stringent control base on standard operating procedure on safety and
health should be introduce and enforcement are must to ensure the safety. The rate
on releasing the radioactive to environment is strongly recommended to control not
only by body of the operation country itself, but also by International Atomic Energy
Agency (IAEA). Japan has 51 commercial nuclear power reactors that provide one-
third of the country's electricity. With few natural resources of its own, Japan imports
nearly all its fuel oil. Since the oil crisis of 1973, successive governments have made
concerted efforts to become self-sufficient. By the year 2010, Japan wants to
produce 42% of its energy in nuclear plants. In the high number of nuclear power
reactors will have very high impact to environment and moreover the safety is not
takes in seriously as accident happened in Japan. Even though US are recognised
as a leader in nuclear power producer, its still have areas that are lack of preparation
to face the consequence as happened in Japan. This has made the US military
forces to turn down the aid requested by Japan government on the accidents.
Even though the method to keep the waste is quite complicated and tedious,
the leakage possible happened because it takes more than 50 years for it to decay,
after which less than one thousandth of its initial radioactivity remains to make it
much easier to handle. Hence canisters of vitrified waste, or used fuel assemblies,
are stored under water in special ponds, or in dry concrete structures or casks for at
least this length of time. After being buried for about 1000 years most of the
radioactivity will have decayed. The amount of radioactivity then remaining would be
similar to that of the naturally-occurring uranium ore from which it originated, though
it would be more concentrated.
Drainage of Acid Mine: Acid mine drainage (AMD), or acid rock drainage
(ARD), is when the pH of water is lowered and made more acidic. This usually
happens in abandoned subsurface mines. The reason is because subsurface
mines, when operational, have to keep pumping the water out of the mine. Once
abandoned, however, the pumping stops and the mine floods. This flood is the initial
step of AMD. Acidity is generated when metal sulfides are oxidized after being
exposed to air and water. Bacteria and archaea decompose the metal ions faster.
These microbes are found naturally in the rock, but their numbers are usually low
due to limited oxygen and water. However, once they are in an environment with an
abundance of water and oxygen, they flourish. Acidophiles are extremophiles that
favour the low pH levels of abandoned mines (low pH caused by AMD). When the
ore is a sulfide or pyrite, the mine has a better chance of generating highly acidic
discharges. Chalcopyrite (the most commonly mined ore of copper) occurs with a
range of other sulfides, so copper mines are highly susceptible for AMD. The water
gets very acidic, which is unhealthy for the land and all the underwater creatures that
it might come in contact with. Mines try to neutralize the water again by adding
limestone chips, but they sometimes form a layer of calcium sulfate, which blinds the
material and stops any further neutralization. Also, they use a method called
Constructed Wetlands to try to neutralize the pH, but this is time-consuming and not
enough to deal with heavily polluted discharge. Constructed wetlands use the
products of bacterial processes to stabilize the pH, but said products are unstable
when exposed to oxygen. Though mining companies try to counteract AMD, they
aren’t having that much success.
Why, then, should we continue having big mines if they are just going to
cause more AMD? Mining is important for the economic growth and employment for
the related nation to enable them to survive and for their needs. All these are
requires every agencies or companies either private or government should play an
active roles in ensure the environment is taking care by actively implement their
corporate social responsibility, and government must strongly enforce the law on
environmental protection even though it is difficult.
Conclusion
Since mining and nuclear power are important for the economic growth and
employment for the related nation to enable them to survive and for their needs, all
these are requires every agencies or companies either private or government
sectors should play an active roles in ensure the environment is taking care by
corporate (MNC) by actively implement their corporate social responsibility, and
government must strongly enforce the law on environmental protection even though
it is difficult.