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The bags of cobalt hydroxide powder at the Tenke-Fungurume mine are equivalent to almost a tenth of the world’s annual consumption.

The bags at the Tenke-Fungurume mine contain a stash of cobalt hydroxide powder equivalent to almost a tenth of the world’s annual consumption.

PHOTO: AFP

Leslie Hook, Harry Dempsey and Ciara Nugent

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The red-brown landscape of Tenke-Fungurume, one of the world’s largest copper and cobalt mines in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), is covered by tens of thousands of dusty sacks.

The bags stacked up by the roadside and piled next to buildings contain a stash of cobalt hydroxide powder equivalent to almost a tenth of the world’s annual consumption – and worth about half a billion dollars.

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