What are coltan and tantalum?
Short for columbite-tantalite, coltan is a black, tar-like mineral used to produce tantalum powder which, in turn, is an essential element used in the manufacture of many portable electronic devices, including mobile phones. Coltan is found and mined in several regions around the world such as Australia, Brazil and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is known that illegally mined coltan from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is contributing to intense political conflict in the region and causing significant harm to wildlife. What is Samsung’ Policy on Coltan? Samsung’s Telecommunication Business has taken the following steps to endeavour that our mobile phones do not contain materials derived from illegally mined Congolese coltan: • We do not purchase coltan directly from the DRC nor from any other source in the form of raw material. A limited number of our component vendors do supply us with tantalum-based components. • In the cases when Samsung does use tantalum-based c
