Our story with Pact and Moyo Gemstones
The Challenge
Today, 80-90% of coloured gemstones are mined by small companies or individuals using limited technology. This artisanal, small-scale mining takes place in 80 countries worldwide, on every continent besides Antarctica, forming an important economic sector for rural communities in many developing nations.
The Lake Victoria Region of East Africa is renowned for its rich deposits of minerals and metals. Tanzania, in particular, is blessed with large reserves of diamonds and coloured gemstones that have turned the city of Arusha into a buzzing international trading hub. Communities here are faced often with unfair working conditions and trade prices, and poor management of environmental impact. The female population, in particular, is at a disadvantage with lack of financial access, low ability to independently seek employment and limited economic security.
The Solution
Together with Pact (under the Pact Mines to Markets program or PactM2M), as well as ANZA Gems and Nineteen48, Everledger is part of Moyo Gemstones, an ethical gemstone collaboration born in Tanzania. Under Moyo Gemstones, our partner PactM2M has established a strong relationship with the Tanzanian Women Miners Association (TAWOMA), to verify the legality of mining and trading and confirm responsible practices of mining. Moyo Gemstones uses our blockchain solution for coloured gemstones – the Provenance Proof Blockchain developed for Gübelin Gem Lab – to track the gemstones mined by the miners in TAWOMA from source.
Together with renowned jewellery group Chow Tai Fook and GIA, we launched a paperless solution delivering diamond grading reports on the blockchain to consumers. This digital platform provides the same independent, accurate and unbiased analysis that GIA has been providing since 1931, but now with greater convenience and traceability. And because it uses the blockchain, it’s based on information that is entirely secure, private and unalterable.
With our technology to underpin it, Chow Tai Fook has been able to strengthen its T MARK diamond brand with a promise based on ‘4Ts’: traceable, truthful, thoughtful and transparent. All backed up by information carried to customers via a T MARK app.
The Results
By allowing the gemstones mined by TAWOMA to be securely traced all the way from miner to market, our solution provides an unalterable record of where a gemstone has been, how it has been processed, and the legacy it leaves behind. It increases transparency throughout the supply chain, empowering the female miners in TAWOMA to work safely, mine better and improve financial security. Additionally, this programme is kindly funded by the House of Gübelin, with no cost to participating mining communities.
Together with Gübelin, we aim to expand this technology to other communities with similar profiles, to eventually include the entire coloured gemstones industry. In the long term, we believe this can create what has long been needed in the gemstones industry: stable, equitable markets for fair trade.
For more information, please visit: www.provenanceproof.io
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