Tens of thousands of miners and gem traders have poured into the rainforests around the village of Bemainty, said local officials. ANTANANARIVO, MADAGASCAR—A sapphire rush has brought tens of thousands of people into the remote rainforests of eastern Madagascar, disfiguring a protected environmental area and prompting calls for military intervention. The government doesn’t dare take concrete action.”Madagascar produces about half of the world’s high-end sapphires, according to Michael Arnstein, president of The Natural Sapphire Company, a U.S.-based gemstone business. In November, a group of about 500 miners went deeper into the protected area to search for gemstones. Pardieu said he expects many more sapphire and ruby mines to be discovered in the protected area over the next five to 10 years: “There is just one deposit after another.”

Source: thestar April 02, 2017 16:25 UTC