German carmaker BMW said on Sunday it was seeking clarity on operations at a Moroccan cobalt mine after a newspaper report cited irregularities that violated labor and environmental laws.
BMW has contacted local supplier Managem with a series of questions and requested additional information, a company spokesman told Reuters.
“If there is wrongdoing, it needs to be rectified,” the spokesman said, adding that there had been initial allegations against Managem in the summer but that the documents provided to BMW appeared credible. Managem’s environmental certificates were up to date.
The November 13 print edition of the German daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung will report that its reporters, working with the NDR and WDR broadcasters, have found serious violations of environmental and labor laws in mines in Morocco, according to the paper’s advance online edition.
According to the report, excessive levels of arsenic were found in water samples and Managem failed to meet international standards for worker protection and cracked down on critical unions.
Managem is majority-owned by the Moroccan monarchy and operates several mines in several African countries.
Cobalt is used, among other things, in electric car batteries.
By far the largest proportion of the world’s cobalt deposits are in the Congo, where child labor is still used, especially in small mines.
BMW no longer buys cobalt from the Congo, the BMW spokesman said. A fifth of its supply comes from Morocco, and the rest from Australia.
