In parts of Africa, sand mining has helped people build sturdier homes. The vast majority of mined sand, however, gets used in the country where it was extracted. In 2018, those trades were worth some $1.9 billion, according to Harvard’s Atlas of Economic Complexity.

In fact, sand is in such demand that cargoes are regularly shipped around the world. This is the 147m-high Great Pyramid of Giza to scaleĬhina is not alone in its drive to build infrastructure and housing. To handle the housing pressure, cities have expanded, adding new structures and building out roads.Ĭhina already has used more cement since 2006 than was used in the United States during the entire 20th century. In just the last 10 years, China’s cities went from housing 51% of the national population to about 60%, according to the National Bureau of Statistics of China. And we researchers still don’t know many things about the magnitude of the impacts.”ĭemand for sand has surged in the last two decades, thanks to urbanisation and construction in China, India and other fast-developing countries. “The number of extraction sites is just huge, which makes it hard to monitor. She researches how sand mining can affect both the natural world and people’s well-being.īut many people still “don’t know about these problems,” Torres said. Sand is a critical material for every country,” said ecologist Aurora Torres at the Universite Catholique de Louvain in Belgium. “This isn’t an issue that’s relevant for only some places. That’s causing environmental damage and, in some cases, jeopardising livelihoods.

The result is that sand is being extracted far more quickly than it can naturally be replaced. And few entities monitor or document the trade for its impact. There are scant regulations for protecting the environment, or workers’ safety. But in much of the world, sand mining faces little to no government scrutiny. According to the UN, the global daily demand for sand is around 18 kg per person on average.ĭemand for sand is only expected to grow, as the global population continues to climb, cities expand and countries further develop.

Dredge mining scars