A veritable gold rush has broken out in the Brazilian Amazon region for years. Much of the prospecting for gold takes place illegally. Most of the 20,000 illegal gold diggers, the so-called garimpeiros, work in indigenous territories where gold digging is forbidden. They are encroaching deeper and deeper into the rainforest, cutting down trees, polluting the water with mercury and bringing with them diseases that can be fatal to the indigenous people who live there.
The income of the garimpeiros comes from the sale of illegally mined gold. But in addition, some stage themselves anonymously on the Internet and earn something extra. Tiktok in particular offers a good platform for this. Its operation and monetization of contributions is simple, the audience is often young and uncritical. The viral videos on the topic of gold prospecting promise huge business – the great disaster that gold mining brings with it is kept secret.
You can find the article on the subject here at poonal.
How Tiktok contributes to the gold rush von News Pool Latin America is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 international.