Critical Response Event: Mining and Instability in the Amazon
Two of the most transformational issues of our time – the transition to clean energy and the AI revolution – are coming at a steep price for the world’s largest tropical rainforest. A mining boom in Brazil is displacing indigenous populations, endangering protected lands and undermining government control in the Amazon Basin. Some of the new mines are extracting rare earth minerals used in data centers, wind turbines and high-tech weapons systems. But at the same time there’s been a global surge in demand for traditional metals such iron, copper, nickel and tin. The price of tin, for instance, has tripled over the past 4 years.
Isabel Harari, an investigative journalist based in São Paulo has been documenting the scramble for minerals in Brazil. In 2025 she was a fellow with the Pulitzer Center’s Rainforest Investigations Network reporting on critical mineral extraction in the Amazon. Her work focuses on human rights abuses and environmental crimes in supply chains. She’s shown how the effects of mining go far beyond environmental degradation. Industrial bauxite pits and illegal gold mines are disrupting efforts for agrarian reform. New mining roads are penetrating deep into what were supposed to be national parks. Corruption is forcing small scale farmers off their land. And as Harari notes in her carefully documented reporting, the vast majority of the minerals dug up in Brazil are exported to wealthier nations abroad.
Join us for a conversation about the new global mining boom and its ramifications in some of the most fragile parts of Brazil. The Q&A will be moderated by Jason Beaubien, Cohen Institute Specialist and Peabody Award winning journalist.
The webinar is free and open to everyone, but advanced registration is required.
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Speaker Biography: Isabel Harari is an investigative journalist based in São Paulo, Brazil, specializing in human rights abuses and environmental crimes in supply chains. She is currently a reporter at Repórter Brasil and was a 2025 fellow of the Pulitzer Center’s Rainforest Investigations Network, investigating the impacts of critical minerals in the Amazon. Harari’s work has been published in numerous outlets including UOL, Mongabay, Sumaúma, InfoAmazonia, Le Monde Diplomatique Brasil, and Agência Pública.
This event is hosted by the Cohen Institute for Holocaust and Genocide Studies at Keene State College as part of our ongoing series of Critical Response Events. These events are meant to spotlight ongoing or emerging crises across the globe. Speakers in this series represent a wide range of scholarly research and views; our guests' perspectives should not be taken as representative of the Cohen Institute or Keene State College as a whole.
This event is part of the Cohen Institute calendar.
To request accommodations for a disability, please contact the coordinator at least two weeks prior to the event.
