Blockchain to track Congo\'s cobalt from mine to mobile

Blockchain will be used for the first time to track the journey of cobalt from mines in Congo (Kim) to products used in smartphones and electric vehicles.
Sources close to the pilot program expected to launch this year say the program will eventually provide manufacturers with a way to ensure cobalt in lithium
Ion batteries for products such as Iphone and Teslas have not yet been mined by children.
Tracking cobalt brings many challenges because a large number of informal mine sites have to be monitored and all participants in the supply chain need to purchase the program and be accurate and need to transmit electronic data from remote areas.
All of this must happen in a big country plagued by wrongdoing.
However, companies are under increasing pressure from consumers and investors to show that the cobalt they use is achieved through a supply chain without abuse of rights, just like they used tin, tungsten, gold for electronic products.
Chinese companies have set up a responsible Cobalt initiative, which tech giants such as Apple and Samsung have joined to address child labor.
The problem they face is that almost no one is sure.
Trace the way cobalt fires from informal mines that produce the fifth cobalt from Congo, the world\'s largest producer.
A source for the project said: \"The need to make cobalt more sustainable will continue to grow, which means that there is a willingness to find a solution and the blockchain will be part of it, he declined to be named because it had not been made public.
Blockchain technology has been applied in the diamond industry.
The gem is given a digital fingerprint and the blockchain keeps track of it when the gem is sold, which gives a fake
A certificate of where the stone came from.
The cobalt supply chain is much more complex, but the developers of the pilot block chain hope
Distributed online database in the form of distributed ledger-
At least some of the major concerns of end users can be tracked.
Sheila Warren, head of blockchain policy at the World Economic Forum, said that given the prevalence of conflicting, illegal and opaque legal systems, how well it works in Congo is an open question.
\"We are working on prototyping, iteration, testing and scaling,\" Warren said . \" He is working with experts on how the blockchain can improve the mineral supply chain.
\"Technology is not the most difficult part.
\"Amnesty International detailed the extent of child labor in the Congo\'s cobalt mining industry in a 2016 report, and the organization said it was looking at the blockchain, especially to track payments to middlemen.
\"You have to be vigilant about technical solutions that are also political and economic issues, but blockchain may help.
\"We are not against it,\" said Amnesty International researcher Mark dammit . \".
Congo has half of the world\'s cobalt reserves and demand for the main mineral composition of lithium
With the surge in electric vehicles, ion batteries will surge.
In 2016, Congo mined 54% of the world\'s 123,000 tons of cobalt.
Automakers like Volkswagen are fighting for the long term
They ask suppliers to ensure that child labor is not used in the supply chain to maintain the production of electric vehicles.
The Congo pilot program is to give a digital label to the sealed cobalt bag produced by each reviewed manual miner, which uses a mobile phone to enter the blockchain, as well as details of the weight, date, time, maybe there\'s a picture.
In the next stage, the trader who purchased the bag will record the details of the blockchain, and the process will be repeated until the ore reaches the smelter
Leave an immutable record of cobalt tours for downstream buyers or third parties.
The pilot will involve organizations across the supply chain, fromthe-
According to those who helped develop the plan, the ground monitor checks the site for no child labor by providing the end user with a refining process.
A potential risk in the supply chain is that the cobalt mined by children is mixed with \"clean\" cobalt before processing.
The industry is trying some options, such as leaving an indelible mark in the refining process, a quality balance method for fair trade certification for products such as cocoa, or connect the blockchain to the computer technology already used by the refiners to monitor the movement of materials in the plant.
Some institutional investors are also pushing mining companies and manufacturers to use blockchain to help clean up the mineral supply chain.
Christine Chow, of Hermes Investment Management, said that tracking cobalt is much more complicated than diamonds and usually takes 12 steps instead of 5 stages.
\"But the principle of recording key features and then entering them into the blockchain stored on the cloud is the same,\" Zhou said, part of the hermes EOS team, advise institutional shareholders on responsible investment.
\"To make it work, the key people in the chain must agree to a set of input data to define its functions,\" said Stephen Chow . \" Stephen Chow\'s team has $425 billion at the suggestion.
The International Council for mining and metals (ICMM) said that its members, including all major mining companies, were in good condition
Leverage the potential of the blockchain to increase public trust in the industry.
\"It doesn\'t solve the whole problem, but it solves a large part of the problem,\" said Tom Butler, CEO of ICMM . \".
\"The quality of the places where the blockchain starts is still a challenge, but in this regard, we are in a privileged position with ICMM members mining responsibly.
Glencore, the world\'s largest producer of cobalt, declined to comment on the use of blockchain.
In its 2016 Sustainability Report, Glencore said that when it purchased cobalt from outside its own production in Congo, it only dealt with third parties that did not use manual mines.