Many probably have old and broken cell phones, tablets and laptops lying at home. Now you can submit them in Jönköping. While making efforts for the environment, vulnerable children and women in Congo can be helped.

Extract minerals

This is possible through a new collaboration between the aid organization PMU and the company Universal Avenue. Four stores in Sweden - in Jönköping, Trollhättan, Alingsås and Trelleborg - receive outdated electronics.

As usual, what can be sold is put out for sale, but the rest is sent to the cooperative that mines tin, tungsten, tantalum and gold from the electronics.

The metals, also called conflict minerals, are valuable substances that often cause conflicts when the material is broken in mines in, for example, the Congo.

- You want to take control of these mines, there is big money in what goes to weapons, among other things. In this war that is taking place around power, it is a systematic way to destroy society from within by raping women and children, says Eva Axell-Hillerström, store manager at PMU Second Hand in Jönköping.

Revenue goes to Congo

PMU has long worked with the Panzi Hospital in Congo, where Peace Prize laureate Denis Mukwege is chief medical officer. The hospital has treated more than 50,000 women and children who have been subjected to sexual violence.

The financial surplus generated by the reuse of the phones goes to the hospital and the work of the relief organization in Congo. At the same time, recycling can lead to mining mining and thus also conflicts.

- It is fantastic that we can work with the Panzi Hospital and help with the mining of minerals. At the same time we reuse and utilize the electronics when it is out of our eyes, says Eva Axell-Hillerström.