the sulfur industry is worth nearly $13 billion globally but the workers who risk their lives to mine it in an active volcano make just $17 a day why because there's a demand for this important ingredient in sugar and that's a pretty decent wage for the area if you look at other booming Industries you'll see the same trend from collecting oai for our smoothie bowls to harvesting our table salt people risk LIF long and limb to make a buck in these billion dooll Industries we journey around the world to see what it's like working some of
the most dangerous jobs on the [Music] planet in East Java Indonesia hundreds of miners face deadly smoke to extract sulfur or Devil's gold sulfur is used in everything for matches fireworks and gunpowder to detergent paper and batteries it's what makes our sugar White working conditions inside Ean volcano are so dangerous many miners don't live past 50 years old miners like M carry up to 200 PB of sulfur on their backs up and down these steep Cliffs and M's been doing it for 30 years [Music] this is as far as M can go on his bike
there are no roads to the crater so he has to walk the rest of the way it's a 2-mile hike up to the ridge of volcano he takes only his basket and a crowbar down into the thousand foot deep crater here he faces the volcano's extreme environment the air can reach over 100° F and he works near one of the world's most toxic [Music] [Music] lakes and there's the smoke the miners are freelance contractors so they have to pay for their own gear and many can't afford gas masks instead they use handkerchiefs or towels dipped
in water to keep the Sulfur powder from sticking but the smoke from inside the volcano is crucial for sulfur production this is how it works when the super hot smoke hits the cooler air outside it condenses liquid and drips off the pipe as it solidifies and cools the sulfur will turn yellow and miners can begin chipping off blocks it's a Silver's two colors that give it the name Devil's gold once he fills his baskets M hoists them up on his shoulder to hike back but that sulfur is not a light load that's about 154 lb
M himself weighs just 132 they have to haul it up the Steep walls of the crater [Music] once he reaches the rim of the crater marar can transfer the sulfur to his trolley and begin the two miles [Applause] back the mining company pays on the weight of their loads they get about 9 cents per kilo with two loads Mard can make $17 a day at the end of the day M returns home to eat dinner with his family and rest Ean looms over them a symbol of how M provides for his family's lives while it
slowly takes his a heavy weight to carry on his shoulders India is one of the world's largest salt producers and roughly a third of it comes from deep in this desert today thousands of families live here farming salt by hand they're known as the agadas and they've been salt producers in this harsh environment for Generations each year they arrive at the dry cracked land of the little r of cooch in October Padia gabay and his wife carry everything they'll need to live in the desert for the next 6 months including supplies to make their Huts
clothes farming tools and all their food and water first they have to find the key to this whole operation salty brine water underground they dig 30 ft into the mud to get to it the families then set up these government subsidized solar panels they'll power the pumps that bring brine water to the surface then the agaras build the salt pans these expansive Salt Flats the roller helps them flatten out the Earth they'll make 10 to 20 pans all by hand it's backbreaking work then the farmers will release the salty brine water from the wells it
flows between the pans by the last Pan the water reaches the 24% salinity needed to form big salt crystals over the next few months as the water evaporates salt crystals form they start raking early each morning to avoid the hottest part of the day but working here can be really dangerous the life expectancy of a farmer is about 60 years because not only do they face extreme temperatures they're dealing with subsoil broin which is highly acidic and you also and exposure to that subsoil broin also comes with a lot of uh problems in [Music] in
many of the agaras become blind from years of the bright Sun reflecting off the white landscape and because they're so far from the nearest Village accessing Medical Care is often too expensive [Music] [Music] despite these conditions the agaras live and work out here until spring when the salt is finally ready they harvest three times the first produces the best quality salt they leave in April usually with over a, tons of salt and most Farmers we spoke to said that this season's market price for salt is between 2 and $4 per ton that means in a
good year a family will earn about $2 ,000 for months of grueling work that's well below the poverty [Music] line most of the world's comes from deep in the Amazon rainforest people here risk climbing 50ft High palm trees to harvest the fruit [Music] you these berries have become one of the most popular so-called superfoods in the US and they aren't cheap One Bowl can cost up to $15 and while the berry has exploded in popularity in recent decades small farms like this haven't really been able to cash in his family's Farm is roughly 70 M
from blang the capital of the state of pah which grows more than 90% of the asai produced in Brazil the only tool they use to climb is a single piece of rope called a ponia they used to be made of leaves today Lucas's son Luis Fernando will go up the trunks are so thin that climbers have to be lightweight at the top they swing from the tree to reach multiple [Music] bunches going down can be dangerous too especially while carrying a large knife and holding an armful of branches dropping them could damage the fragile fruit
Lucas and his family harvested 53 baskets like these in 2021 earning them an income of about $950 that's as little as 20 cents per pound meanwhile a pound of processed assai sorbet can sell for $7 or more in the US part of the issue is that Lucas has to sell his assai as soon as possible because the fruit goes bad fast that leaves farmers who don't have processing machines with little leverage to negotiate Merchants bring the asai to bang by boat it's a race against the clock to sell the fruit before it spoils so markets
run overnight some assai gets transported to processing facilities like North assai every day 22 tons of fruit are turned into frozen pulp the assai that most people outside of pah are familiar with indigenous people people living in the Amazon have harvested and consumed asai for centuries maybe even Millennia the Brazilian government estimates there are nearly 6,000 kilom Bola communities in the country in a 2013 study found roughly 75% still lived in extreme poverty this is in snow it's Limestone and miners risk their lives to carve it out of the white quaries of Egypt the valuable
rock is at the center of a huge industry and it's used to make everything from cement and glass to plastic and tiles it's even what the great pyramids were made out of but digging up and cutting these precious blocks is really dangerous for these guys each day starts in niia City at dawn and this is where the danger begins these trucks aren't meant for passengers workers have gotten injured from Falls along the winding Journey the trip to the mountain takes about 40 minutes then it's time to get suited up since these miners are Freelancers they
have to buy their own protective gear often homemade cloth masks gloves and sunglasses are all miners have to Shield them they grab their tools and descend into the pit first miners have to set up these two rails two separate machines Roll Along the tracks They slice the stone into perfect cuboids beneath the machines move quickly they're really heavy and they're loud workers shout at each other to warn the machines are nearby because the real Hazard is those saws a quick step is all that separates miners from razor sharp blade miners are responsible for fixing the
machines when they break and sharpening the Blades by hand that's also risky work the cutting machines used to have coverings but they fell off years ago now the blades are exposed as the machines cut stone they kick up rocks and a haunting White Cloud of limestone powder if there's no wind miners disappear in it like ghosts it's easy to inhale the fine dust and if they breathe it long enough it can cause a lung condition called silicosis injuries sickness and death in these minds are widely reported but there aren't any official numbers at one point
the life expectancy here was just 45 years old Zaki says many mine owners will offer under $200 by way of workers comp perfectly cut stones that haven't been sold yet get stacked but these blocks have already been purchased so miners throw them straight into the truck and they have perfect aim if they're lucky they might get a $3 stip in for food and tea on top of their $6 daily wage these men are climbing slippery Limestone Cliffs risking Falls of up to 100 ft they're looking for a rare nest made of bird saliva that's found
inside caves across southeast Asia in the Philippines the Harvesters are known as bushors for centuries alvino's family have put their lives on the line to gather swiftlet nests just2 is worth $2,900 and it's used to make a soup that locals believe is good for your health Alvin and his crew gather at bangalan Point on Mighty G island and they're heading to naath Island it's one of the 7,000 islands that make up the Philippines and it can only be reached by boat they get off the boat and walk Barefoot across the slippery and sharp rocks they
make the ladder as they're climbing up they tighten the bamboo with rope then they attach a piece of wood called kitang to the ladder the stakes are high fore but Advanced bushors like him sometimes use little to no support only their hands and feet this is the most dangerous way to climb in the regional language it's known as gagang Kang Lang or like a crab Alvin has had some close calls and he dislocated his shoulder once forland is completely remote if there's an emergency there's no way to quickly get help after spotting the nests Alvin
uses a spray bottle filled with water to loosen them they're then gently peeled away from the cave walls [Music] after harvesting the bushors clean them to remove any feathers or branches then they divide them by their hardness and color the local city hall buys the nests from the bushors at a regulated price and sells them to private customers around the world they are the main ingredient in bird's nest soup a delicacy in China and around the world a bowl can cost as much as $100 in recent years demand for the nests and bird's nest soup
has gone [Music] up Alvin is finally home after 2 days of hunting for nests the season is almost over you just watched excerpts from some of our big business and Risky Business stories click here to watch the rest of these videos [Music]
