I’m not sure where you sourced your information from, but certainly not from commodity books about tantalum. Fact is that only 15% of global reserves are found in Africa, not the 80% that have always been quoted.

This figure was even used by the IUCN when it started the conservation compaign in 2001, but somehow got changed to that far more “sexy” 80% and has been mindlessly replicated since.

http://tierra.rediris.es/coltan/coltanenvir.pdf

Also you should have a look at commodity prices for tantalum over the last 10 years. There was a huge spike in prices between end of 2000 until end of 2001 based on the internet bubble and speculation, but since then prices have come down to their normal levels. As a result illegal mining of coltan became basically unattractive to the Congolese. So they also stopped eating the gorillas.

I think the whole coltan issue is a perfect example of the gap between changing markets and mounting campaigns, in this case market conditions changed rapidly but ethical campaigns have been very slow to notice (and might even contiue today).

- Coltan isn’t another name for tantalite, it’s a mix of tantalite and columbite. But they’re usually found together. See http://www.galleries.com/minerals/oxides/tantalit/tantalit.htm .

- Although 80% of the world’s reserves are in the Congo, supposedly over 50% of the world’s present production is in Australia, by a company called sons of Gwalia. (Although another source says it’s just 25%.) Unfortunately this company went bankrupt, but its creditors are running it now, so apparently it’s still producing. There are also a few smaller tantalum mines in Canada and other places around the world. Depending where we source our capacitors, China might be the best choice because it’d require the least transportation energy to get the tantalum to the capacitor manufacturer (assuming the latter would also be in China; if they’re made in the US, we could source tantalum from Canada, etc.)

- Raw materials like this are a fungible commodity, so sourcing good stuff might not reduce world demand for bad stuff. “Conflict-free” diamonds have had a positive impact, but diamonds are a luxury good usually given for symbolic/cultural purposes, while tantalum capacitors are used for hidden utilitarian components in commodity electronic devices, so it’s unclear whether conflict-free tantalum would affect the world market.

- You have a good point about it being the only livelihood in some places, but even there, the miners themselves generally get only a tiny share of the profits. You would have to set up a “conflict free” and “fair trade” tantalum sourcing operation to really address this, which I think is beyond the scope of our budget and time.

- It might still be worth a shot to try sourcing conflict-free tantalum from Australia or Canada, because maybe it would have a positive effect on the market, but even in the best of circumstances, tantalum capacitors are more energy-intensive to produce than aluminum-electrolytic or ceramics, because the scarcity of the material requires more transportation as mentioned above. Also, while the refining of tantalum uses less energy than the refining of aluminum, it uses much nastier chemicals (hydrofluoric acid, sulphuric acid, methyl isobutyl ketones), and because of its scarcity it’s not a renewable resource, so it’s not a good environmental choice anyway.