| Mexican consultants Mónica Cantú and Vivian Heredia are on the verge of certifying the first "responsible" mine in the Western Hemisphere. Minerals and metals are in everything we use. From the gold connectors inside smartphones and the aluminum in refrigerators to the fluoride in toothpaste, we depend on mining companies’ extractive operations far more than we might realize. Behind such operations is an industry with a record of repression of workers, fouling the environment and displacing rural peoples. It doesn’t have to be this way, says Mónica Cantú, a 45-year-old psychologist spearheading a groundbreaking effort to raise the standard for mining companies in her native Mexico. Along with her business partner, Vivian Heredia, Cantú is inches away from certifying the first “responsible mine” in the Western Hemisphere — an unprecedented move meant to disrupt mining across the world by forcing companies to enact environmental and humanitarian protections. | 
