But cobalt is just cobalt. You have no way of telling where it came from. Humans have faces, fingerprints and genes that allow us to have documentation that yes this person is a citizen and not an illegal immigrant, so you cannot use documentation for one person to slip by another that easily.
There is no such thing for cobalt. A document that states this 20 tons of cobalt is not dug up by kids applies just as well to a 20 tons that actually was dug up by kids.
That issue was with blood diamonds. A semilegit mine sold it’s own diamonds and blood diamonds as it’s own.