Indonesia, Bangka, 2010
Bangka is an island on which since 1997 the villagers became rich, because in that year the government had relaxed the strict tin mining rights. There are also pepper, palmoil and rubber plantations for export. Because there is so much more work here than elsewhere in Indonesia, lots of workers from Jawa and Sumatera are coming here.

The tin mining on land, like on these pictures, is run by individual owners from the villages around. In every family there is at least one mine owner, who runs his mine together with 2 or more other friends. With the help of water, they wash constantly growing wholes into the ground, and afterwards they wash the tin out of the sand. The land they use was previously used by big foreign mining companies.