Editing Environmental racism (section)

=== Africa ===
{{Main|Environmental issues in Africa}}

====Nigeria====
[[File:Oil-spill.jpg|thumb|Oil spill]]
{{further|Environmental issues in the Niger Delta}}

From 1956 to 2006, up to 1.5 million tons of oil were spilled in the [[Niger Delta]], (50 times the volume spilled in the [[Exxon Valdez oil spill|Exxon Valdez disaster]]).<ref>{{Cite web |title=UNPO: Ogoni: Niger Delta Bears Brunt after Fifty Years of Oil Spills |url=https://unpo.org/article/5703 |access-date=2022-11-13 |website=unpo.org|date=2 November 2009 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=2010-05-29 |title=Nigeria's agony dwarfs the Gulf oil spill. The US and Europe ignore it |url=http://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/may/30/oil-spills-nigeria-niger-delta-shell |access-date=2022-11-13 |website=the Guardian |language=en}}</ref> Indigenous people in the region have suffered the loss of their livelihoods as a result of [[Environmental issues in the Niger Delta|these environmental issues]], and they have received no benefits in return for enormous oil revenues extracted from their lands. Environmental conflicts have exacerbated ongoing [[conflict in the Niger Delta]].<ref name="HRW Nigeria95">{{cite web |date=July 1995 |title=Nigeria, The Ogoni Crisis, Vol. 7, No. 5 |url=https://www.hrw.org/legacy/reports/1995/Nigeria.htm |access-date=December 15, 2014 |publisher=Human Rights Watch}}</ref><ref name="Osaghae 1995">{{Cite journal |last=Osaghae |first=Eghosa E. |date=1995 |title=The Ogoni Uprising: Oil Politics, Minority Agitation and the Future of the Nigerian State |journal=African Affairs |volume=94 |issue=376 |pages=325–344 |doi=10.1093/oxfordjournals.afraf.a098833 |jstor=723402 |issn=0001-9909|doi-access=free }}</ref><ref name=":110">{{Cite journal |last=Agbonifo |first=John |title=Oil, Insecurity, and Subversive Patriots in the Niger Delta: The Ogoni as Agent of Revolutionary Change |date=2009 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/45194563 |journal=Journal of Third World Studies |volume=26 |issue=2 |pages=71–106 |jstor=45194563 |issn=8755-3449}}</ref>

Burning of [[toxic waste]] and urban [[air pollution]] are problems in more developed areas.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Gall|first1=Timothy|title=Worldmark Encyclopedia of the Nations|last2=Derek|first2=Gleason|date=2012|publisher=Gale, Cengage Learning|location=Detroit|page=545}}</ref>

[[Ogoni people]], who are indigenous to Nigeria's oil-rich Delta region have protested the disastrous environmental and economic effects of [[Shell Nigeria|Shell Oil's]] drilling and denounced [[human rights abuse]]s by the [[Federal government of Nigeria|Nigerian government]] and by Shell. Their international appeal intensified dramatically after the execution in 1995 of [[Ogoni Nine|nine Ogoni activists]], including [[Ken Saro-Wiwa]], who was a founder of the nonviolent [[Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People]] (MOSOP).<ref>{{cite book|last1=Spitulnik|first1=Debra|title=Small Media Against Big Oil (Nigeria)|date=2011|publisher=Thousand Oaks: SAGE Publications, Inc.|page=459}}</ref>

==== South Africa ====
The linkages between the mining industry and the negative impacts it has on community and individual health has been studied and well-documented by a number of organizations worldwide. Health implications of living in proximity to mining operations include effects such as pregnancy complications, mental health issues, various forms of cancer, and many more.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Mancini|first1=Lucia|last2=Sala|first2=Serenella|date=1 August 2018|title=Social impact assessment in the mining sector: Review and comparison of indicators frameworks|journal=Resources Policy|language=en|volume=57|pages=98–111|doi=10.1016/j.resourpol.2018.02.002|bibcode=2018RePol..57...98M |issn=0301-4207|doi-access=free}}</ref> During the [[Apartheid]] period in South Africa, the mining industry grew quite rapidly as a result of the lack of environmental regulation. Communities in which mining corporations operate are usually those with high rates of poverty and unemployment. Further, within these communities, there is typically a divide among the citizens on the issue of whether the pros of mining in terms of economic opportunity outweigh the cons in terms of the health of the people in the community. Mining companies often try to use these disagreements to their advantage by magnifying this conflict. Additionally, mining companies in South Africa have close ties with the national government, skewing the balance of power in their favor while simultaneously excluding local people from many decision-making processes.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Leonard|first=Llewellyn|date=7 December 2018|title=Mining Corporations, Democratic Meddling, and Environmental Justice in South Africa|journal=Social Sciences|language=en|volume=7|issue=12|pages=259|doi=10.3390/socsci7120259|issn=2076-0760|doi-access=free}}</ref> This legacy of exclusion has had lasting effects in the form of impoverished South Africans bearing the brunt of ecological impacts resulting from the actions of, for example, mining companies. Some argue that to effectively fight environmental racism and achieve some semblance of justice, there must also be a reckoning with the factors that form situations of environmental racism such as rooted and institutionalized mechanisms of power, social relations, and cultural elements.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Schlosberg|first=David|date=2004|title=Reconceiving Environmental Justice: Global Movements And Political Theories|journal=Environmental Politics|language=en|volume=13|issue=3|pages=517–540|doi=10.1080/0964401042000229025|bibcode=2004EnvPo..13..517S |issn=0964-4016|s2cid=56387891}}</ref>

The term "[[energy poverty]]" is used to refer to "a lack of access to adequate, reliable, affordable and clean energy carriers and technologies for meeting energy service needs for cooking and those activities enabled by electricity to support economic and human development". Numerous communities in South Africa face some sort of energy poverty.<ref name="Fakier">{{cite journal|last=Fakier|first=Khayaat|date=May 2018|title=Women and Renewable Energy in a South African Community: Exploring Energy Poverty and Environmental Racism|journal=Journal of International Women's Studies|volume=19|pages=166–167}}</ref> South African women are typically in charge of taking care of both the home and the community as a whole. Those in economically impoverished areas not only have to take on this responsibility, but there are numerous other challenges they face. Discrimination on the basis of gender, race, and class are all still present in South African culture. Because of this, women, who are the primary users of public resources in their work at home and for the community, are often excluded from any decision-making about control and access to public resources. The resulting energy poverty forces women to use sources of energy that are expensive and may be harmful both to their own health and that of the environment. Consequently, several renewable energy initiatives have emerged in South Africa specifically targeting these communities and women to correct this situation.<ref name="Fakier" />