Conflict neutral
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Conflict Neutral is a term used to describe offsetting the negative impact of the diamond trade by donating a small percentage of a diamond sale's value to a trusted charity.
The following information is from the Kimberley Process website:
The Kimberley Process is an international certification scheme that regulates the trade in rough diamonds. Its aim is to prevent the trade in conflict diamonds, while helping to protect the legitimate trade in rough diamonds.
The Kimberley Process Certification Scheme (KPCS) has developed a set of minimum requirements that each Participant must implement. See Sections II, V (a), VI (8,9) of the KPCS document. Monitoring is through peer review visits (with government, industry and civil society participation), annual reporting and statistical reporting. Virtually all KP participants have now invited review of their implementation.
How do I know I am not buying a conflict diamond?
While the vast majority of the rough diamond trade is regulated by the Kimberley Process, we encourage you to be sure. Here are some helpful hints to follow when purchasing a diamond:
Always buy from a reputable retailer.
Don't be afraid to ask questions like, where were the stones imported from? In which country were they mined? Were the stones traded under the auspices of the Kimberley Process?
Your retailer should be able to answer these questions for you.
The most important tip to guard against purchasing a conflict diamond is to use your intuition. Do not be afraid to shop around. If something arouses your suspicions move on to another retailer. Unless you are satisfied with the answers and service provided, do not make your purchase.
The key things to note are that:
1. It is only uncut diamonds which are regulated. 2. You must rely on reputation to be sure of non-conflict status.
It follows that it is impossible to prove if an individual diamond is conflict free.
When you go in to a Jewellers if you ask them to prove that an individual diamond is conflict free they cannot.
The jewellery trade relies upon trust to ensure legal trade. There is however alot of money involved and temptation is great. This is why there is still an, albeit reduced, illegal trade in diamonds.
In addition to this, basic economics tells us that the value of something depends upon supply and demand. By trading in diamonds we are creating demand. If there were no demand it would be impossible to trade diamonds illegally so by just selling a diamond legitemately we are contributing to the illegal trade.
In many ways you could say that there is no such thing as a conflict free diamond.
So, if we want to buy diamonds but not contribute to the horrors of africa what can we do? Beyond being as sure as possible that our individual diamond is ethically sourced the only thing we can do is to offset the harm by doing good. A simple donation, say 1% of the value of the sale, to a reputable charity working to counter the ills caused by diamonds.
Blood Diamond Ltd. originated this concept and call this being "Conflict-Neutral", (although by any other name it is the same concept).
See www.conflictneutral.com for more information
