Roving bandits and looted coastlines: How the global appetite for sand is fueling a crisis
Phys.org / May 4, 2020

Next to water, sand is our most consumed natural resource. The global demand for sand and gravel stands between 40 billion and 50 billion tonnes annually, according to the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), and its scarcity is an emerging global crisis.

The world may run out of sand if we do not start paying attention to sand as a resource that needs research, management and governance.

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As sand markets boom, entrepreneurs, organized crime and other groups have emerged to cash in…

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And, in Myanmar, households living along rivers may be involved in informal river sand collection.

Sand mining can be dangerous. Miners may drown as they harvest sand by hand underwater, and hundreds of sand miners, grassroots activists, journalists, police officers, government officials and others have been killed in clashes over sand.

A diverse set of players including organized crime are involved in the sand mining industry. Roving bandits hunt for sand deposits to dredge, and operations may be hidden from port authorities using high-tech GPS spoofing devices. Local mafia-like structures—in India and likely in at least 70 countries—control entire sand mines and districts.