Customers might not be so eager to buy an expensive piece of gold jewellery if they knew what went on behind the scenes. With a myriad of ethical issues involved in mining, establishing a means to identify gold’s provenance as genuinely ethical and environmentally friendly is crucial – clean gold.
While many companies are considering using blockchain technology to validate the origins of the gold they sell, there are certainly numerous challenges. As Geneva Abdul writes in The New York Times, “blockchain is a growing niche within the global jewellery industry.” Titans like LVMH and De Beers are considering using blockchain-based platforms, but “experts from the Royal College of Art in London argue that there are shortcomings to certification. Workers rarely receive fair prices for gold even as global gold prices increase, and Fairmined gold is said to represent less than half a ton of gold per year, a fraction of what the world’s jewelry companies use.”
Clean Mining, a part of the Clean Earth Technologies group, has set itself on a path of accountability. The company has established a trademark—Clean Gold™—for certifying all the gold produced via Clean Mining’s eco-friendly and sustainable technology — a proprietary thiosulphate-based leaching solution that can completely replace the need to use cyanide.
The “leaf” logo appears on both bullion and consumer jewellery, providing gold producers, manufacturers, jewellery companies, and consumers with evidence that their gold was made with “clean” methods.
*Source: The New York Times
