Call for Clean Up in La Oroya
11 January 2006
As the environmental and public health situation deteriorates in a Peruvian city, pressure increases on the government and US-based Doe Run corporation to honor obligations to reduce pollution.
Following a recent health study of the Peruvian highland city of La Oroya by the University of St. Louis School of Public Health, last month 13 members of Peru’s congress formally called on the Ministry of Energy and Mines and the Ministry of Health to declare a state of emergency in the area.
The move marks the most recent effort to force the owner of the metal processing facility in La Oroya, Doe Run-Peru, to meet its obligations under an environmental management plan instituted when it bought the metal smelting operation in 1997.
La Oroya is a rich mining area where lead, cooper, gold, and other metals are processed. It is also now one of the most polluted places in the country, according to studies by Peru’s Ministry of Health, and National Environmental Authority CONAM. This severe pollution has been generated by decades of irresponsible mining activity, and the government blames Doe Run-Peru for 99 percent of the pollution.
Children living near the smelter in La Oroya have high levels of lead in their blood—as much as four times that permitted by the World Health Organization, according to the preliminary results of the 2005 St. Louis University study.
Despite the well-documented public health crisis, Doe Run-Peru, a subsidiary of the Doe Run Corporation of Missouri, has presented a petition to the Ministry of Energy and Mines in December to extend the deadline for compliance with their Environmental Upgrade and Management Plan (PAMA) until 2010.
When Doe Run acquired the plant in La Oroya, a city of 30,000 people, it committed to completing the PAMA by the end of 2006. The company is seeking a five-year extension that would delay construction of a sulfuric acid plant intended to reduce the amount of toxic fumes currently being released.
Last week Peruvian newspapers ranked Doe Run-Peru as the fourth most successful mining company in the country, generating more than $470 million during 2005. This distinction undermines company claims that it lacks financial resources to finish implementation of the PAMA.
According to the text of the motion in Peru’s congress, “The preliminary results of this study indicate a grave health crisis in La Oroya.” The motion cites data showing that the citizens of La Oroya have “elevated levels of antimony, lead, cadmium, and arsenic in the blood…indicating a critical environmental problem that affects all of the population, especially infants and young children, and show that, despite all of the efforts of the Government’s Environmental Health Authority (DIGESA) and the Doe Run Company to reduce the dangerous blood lead levels over the last five years, there has been no decrease…”
The La Oroya Health Care Movement (MOSAO), a grassroots organization in the city, is calling for Doe Run-Peru to comply with the PAMA. In a statement following the release of the preliminary results of the St. Louis University study, a MOSAO representative said, “we request a firm position by the Ministry of Energy and Mining with regards to Doe Run’s request to lengthen their PAMA. A letter is circulating via internet that outlines the history of contamination in the area, and this letter is collecting signatures that will be presented to Minister Glodomiro Sánchez.”
Oxfam America supports the work of a five-member “Mesa Tecnica,” or technical committee of environmental, legal, and economic groups that advise MOSAO. Oxfam contributed $19,000 to the overall $89,000 cost of the St. Louis University study. To further support the efforts of the people of La Oroya to assert their rights to live in a healthy environment, Oxfam is also calling on its eCommunity supporters in the United States to participate in MOSAO's petition drive.
“The public health crisis in La Oroya is a human tragedy,” said Keith Slack, Oxfam’s senior policy advisor. “Doe Run should comply with its commitments and do everything possible to protect the health of the local population.”
