Many people in Da Lat and neighbouring areas brought hoes, shovels and buckets to Xuan Huong Lake to find tin.

Da Lat authorites began a one-year project to dredge Xuan Huong Lake in January 2010. After the mud layer was removed, residents found a layer of soil with several kinds of metals, including tin. Now they flock to the lake for mining.

Hundreds of people divided into small groups to work very hard from early morning until afternoon. In each sifting, they collect around 200g of tin. High profits from tin encourage more people to work, hindering workers who are dredging the lake. Tin mining has been banned at the lake, so now the illegal miners work at night.

A woman commented that, if they can freely mine for tin, without having to hide from the police, her three-member family could collect 7-9kg of tin.

Some residents revealed that the mud-transporting company offers to sell mud at the price of 1.7 million dong/truck. Still, no one buys it because they are not sure about the tin content. They also don’t have water to sift the tin.

Hoang Loi, chief of the city’s Department of Natural Resources and Environment, noted that the tin output is not much.

Since the lake was emptied, residents caught fish and searched for lost gold, but now they mine the lake.

Mining for tin:

Source: VNExpress