Editor’s Note
This article examines the human cost behind the booming wellness industry’s demand for quartz crystals, highlighting the dangerous informal labor conditions faced by miners in the global supply chain.
A Western wellness industry is capitalizing on the craze for quartz, prized for its supposedly curative properties despite a lack of scientific evidence. This comes at the peril of the lives of miners subjected to informal labor.
Some retailers claim their crystals come from responsible sources, but the supply chain remains opaque. The majority of the world’s crystalline quartz is now extracted in developing countries, notably in China, India, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Myanmar. Consequently, the traceability of the stones’ origin is compromised. This extraction relies primarily on informal labor, and it is rare for miners to be provided with special equipment, such as reinforced boots or helmets.
She believes the working conditions and risks miners face “will not change until consumers demand sustainable healing crystals.”
In South Africa, about a hundred kilometers from Johannesburg, Linki Mugidi works crouched at the mouth of a hand-dug tunnel. She chisels the walls in search of those famous crystals prized by Western wellness practitioners, for $4 a day.
She performs this work ten to twelve hours a day, with one Sunday off per month.
Ironically, the unregulated working conditions faced by many miners contrast with how crystals are used to soothe anxiety or balance energies. Orchid Sunrise, who runs an online shop selling quartz crystals, is conflicted about this.
Last fall, Le Journal de Montréal reported on the release of a documentary series titled “The Dangers of Healing Crystals” by Audrey Ruel-Manseau and Joris Cottin. It was learned that on the island of Madagascar, quartz extraction comes at the expense of miners, often teenagers who risk their lives for a pittance.
