GNV News – July 30, 2025

On July 24, 2025, Peruvian authorities announced that they had seized about 4 tons of mercury believed to be used for illegal gold mining. The mercury, seized in June of the same year at the Port of Callao in Lima, Peru’s capital, was loaded on a cargo ship traveling from Mexico to Bolivia and had been hidden in bags mixed with gravel. The bags were labeled “crushed stone,” but an inspection by Peru’s customs agency SUNAT found the mercury embedded in the gravel. The amount seized is said to be the largest ever in the Amazon region.

Mercury is used in gold mining, and the procedure is as follows. First, rock containing gold is collected, crushed, and placed in a container, into which mercury is poured. The gold adheres to the mercury to form a silvery alloy called amalgam; when this is heated, the mercury evaporates and pure gold can be recovered. However, the high concentrations of mercury vapor generated during heating are said to cause serious health effects for miners and nearby residents.

Illegal gold mining is rampant in Peru, and in 2024 exports of illegally mined gold reached 6.8 billion US dollars. As gold prices continue to soar globally, trade in such illegally mined gold has become a major source of income for criminal groups in Mexico and Peru. Peru’s Congress is debating an extension of the mining formalization registry system (Reinfo), established to regulate artisanal and small-scale mining, but so far it has not produced results. Because miners who apply for this formalization registry are exempt from criminal liability, many workers have been able to continue illegally mining gold. Since such illegal mining takes place outside the law, the use of toxic substances, mining in prohibited areas, and disregard for environmental and safety regulations have become commonplace. As a result, many health impacts—such as large-scale deforestation, mercury poisoning, and infectious diseases stemming from poor sanitation around mining sites—have been documented, posing a serious threat to Peru’s rich natural environment and public health.

Learn more about illegal gold mining → “Peru: Illegal gold mining entangling the world”

Learn more about environmental activists → “Latin America: Environmental defenders under threat”

A boat extracting gold using riverbed mud and mercury in Peru (Photo:
USAID Biodiversity & Forestry / Flickr [CC BY-NC 2.0])