How miners’ hunt for metals to power electric cars threatens Sámi reindeer herders’ homeland
Some of the metals that are key to a green transportation transition can be found in Arctic Europe. But they lie beneath a landscape that's vital to the Sami way of life.
Tuomas Siilasjoki and Minna Näkkäläjärvi say they were taken by surprise when a mobile drill rig one day appeared in the horizon. Nobody had asked them about exploring for minerals inside their siida, a reindeer foraging area, in northern Finland. The Sámi families here in Tarvantovaara wilderness area fear the world’s hunger for metals to ramp up the green economy will destroy their indigenous way of life.
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