Surprisingly, when the price of the copper lows, the accident rate falls. Chilean miners go to the Atacama Desert in order to search for the mineral without supervision, which strongly increases the rate of mining accidents. The numbers speak from themselves: “the safest year in the history of Chilean mining was 1999, with just 0.09 deaths for every million hours worked. That year copper sold for just 72 cents a pound”.
With the media boom that took place in Chile in August, 2010, when 33 miners were trapped deep underground, the Chilean government succeed. But the challenge is to improve the security measures without skimping. The Chilean government promised to improve the safety measures of the mines, and, although the conditions at work are way better, it is not enough. According to the Chilean legislature, there is not a national organism that regulates and verifies the work conditions of the big mining companies, which makes the process even more complicated. Furthermore, many accidents that occur while the miners head out in search of minerals are not counted as labor accidents in the statistics. In spite of the little success of the Chilean government, Sebastian Piñera needs to ratify the ILO and put into practice the promises made.
Source: http://www.economist.com/blogs/americasview/2011/10/mining-safety-chile
I agree, the government should take action and make the mines safer. As a consequence of the accident in August 2010,when 33 miners were trapped in a mine in Chile, the government promised to make mines a safer place. Unfortunatelly in order to supervise the mines they need to change the law. In my opinion the chilean government should take action on this matter so it does not happen again.
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