Cobalt Red

How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives

By: Siddharth Kara

Narrated by: Peter Ganim

Length: 11 hrs and 18 mins

Publisher's summary

Long-listed, New York Times Book Review Notable Books of the Year, 2023

Long-listed, New Yorker Best Books of the Year, 2023

This program includes an author's note read by the author.

An unflinching investigation reveals the human rights abuses behind the Congo’s cobalt mining operation—and the moral implications that affect us all.

Cobalt Red is the searing, first-ever exposé of the immense toll taken on the people and environment of the Democratic Republic of the Congo by cobalt mining, as told through the testimonies of the Congolese people themselves. Activist and researcher Siddharth Kara has traveled deep into cobalt territory to document the testimonies of the people living, working, and dying for cobalt. To uncover the truth about brutal mining practices, Kara investigated militia-controlled mining areas, traced the supply chain of child-mined cobalt from toxic pit to consumer-facing tech giants, and gathered shocking testimonies of people who endure immense suffering and even die mining cobalt.

Cobalt is an essential component to every lithium-ion rechargeable battery made today, the batteries that power our smartphones, tablets, laptops, and electric vehicles. Roughly 75 percent of the world’s supply of cobalt is mined in the Congo, often by peasants and children in sub-human conditions. Billions of people in the world cannot conduct their daily lives without participating in a human rights and environmental catastrophe in the Congo. In this stark and crucial audiobook, Kara argues that we must all care about what is happening in the Congo—because we are all implicated.

A Macmillan Audio production from St. Martin’s Press.

©2023 Siddharth Kara (P)2023 Macmillan Audio

Critic reviews

“With extraordinary tenacity and compassion, Siddharth Kara evokes one of the most dramatic divides between wealth and poverty in the world today. His reporting on how the dangerous, ill-paid labor of Congo children provides a mineral essential to our cellphones will break your heart. I hope policy-makers on every continent will read this book.”—Adam Hochschild, author of King Leopold's Ghost

"Cobalt Red is a riveting, eye-opening, terribly important book that sheds light on a vast ongoing catastrophe. Everyone who uses a smartphone, an electric vehicle, or anything else powered by rechargeable batteries needs to read what Siddharth Kara has uncovered."—Jon Krakauer, author of Into Thin Air

"Meticulously researched and brilliantly written by Siddharth Kara, Cobalt Red documents the frenzied scramble for cobalt and the exploitation of the poorest people in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.”—Baroness Arminka Helic, House of Lords, UK

Great book about an awful subject t

This is an eye opening and disheartening look at how greed and suppression of information lead to humans making victims of their fellows.

Best exposure of child labor I have ever read! Ex

Exposes role of China, but not the history of United States in the rape of the Congo.

Thank you for this

Ah, this book was informative, infuriating, thought provoking and a call to action that everyone consuming these products should understand the cost to the people in Africa.

How can we stop this atrocity?

How can we, the consumers of tech devices, stand up to the corporations that produce these devices, and demand that the Congalese Artisinal diggers of calbolt partake in the prosperity, welfare, and benefits?
Do we organize mass protests on behalf of the Congalese workers without voices?
Do we organize a mass letter writing campaign to the cooperate CEO's?
In mass do we unite and stop purchasing devices until concrete changes are made to benefit the Congaese workers?
How does the average citizens in the developed world realistically stop inadvertently exploiting the Congalese Artisinal worker through purchasing electronic devices?

A sad truth of our world today

I wish I could do more to her involved to help these poor people in the DRC. It's ridiculous that the people with the power and money are doing nothing to help these people.

nice work and great narration

The author did reasonable work to put the story and word out with the new electric revolution and its negative impact on the lower end of the supply chain. the narration was spot on with a voice change for various characters and explicit emotions in the voice where needed.

Powerful expose

Eye opening expose of the cobalt extraction industry and the powerful interests who ignore the dismal plight of artisanal miners.

An important and riveting book

This book is about the latest chapter in colonialism's ravaging of the Congo. It describes a system, fueled by greed and corruption, by which cobalt is extracted from the earth before it makes its way to our phones, laptops and EVs. Congolese workers, including children, the Congolese economy as a whole, and the environment pay a horrible price while Congolese politicians, Chinese companies that own the mines, and the tech companies that use the cobalt get filthy rich.

Kara devoted years and took considerable risks to report this impactful story. I tip my hat to him.

Everyone should read this book

The author did an amazing job explaining the root of the issue and how exploitative the bottom of the value ladder is to the people of the Congo. We ALL share in the blame. Our conveniences have a cost and the men, women and children of the Congo pay the price everyday with their blood, their souls and most of all, with their self-respect and dignity.

Fantastic

A fantastic deep researched book, that will bring you through the most dire parts of the Congo. One only wishes that the tech giants would read this too