Fidele Musafiri: Miner
Cell phones and laptops rely on a particular mineral called colombite tantalum – coltan for short - and the growing demand for the material in the west has had ramifications in some pretty distant corners of the world.
Best News Feature2009 Third Coast / Richard H. Driehaus Foundation Competition2009 / Gregory Warner / Homeland Productions' Working series, USA
Cell phones and laptops rely on a particular mineral called colombite tantalum – coltan for short - and the growing demand for the material in the west has had ramifications in some pretty distant corners of the world.
Reporter Gregory Warner visited the Democratic Republic of Congo, where most of the world's coltan is found, and where military factions are vying for control of an industry worth millions of dollars. There he met miner Fidele Musafiri who is just barely scraping by.
Fidele Musafiri, Miner won the Best News Feature Award in the 2009 Third Coast / Richard H. Driehaus Foundation Competition. The story was produced with editor John Haas and engineer Ben Shapiro.
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Gregory Warner (@radiogrego) is the host of NPR's first internationally-themed podcast, Rough Translation .