To Buy or Not To Buy....
(continued from December 2004 newsletter)

  Within the last few years, the gemstones most questioned in this regard are diamonds.  This has come about due to the dismal state of affairs in some of the world’s major diamond producing countries, particularly Sierra Leone and Angola.  And for decades before that, the sorry treatment of black miners in the apartheid regime of South Africa had always cast an unwelcome shadow on the sparkle of an industry that only wants people to believe in "love", "desirability", and "forever".

  But diamonds are not the only guilty stones in this scenario.  For example, rubies, jade, emeralds, and lapis lazuli are in the menagerie, as well as others.  These rubies and jade come from Burma (called Myanmar by its military dictators), the emeralds from gang-ridden Colombia, and the beautiful blue lapis lazuli from Afghanistan.  It’s hard to say how much money was made in the latter country by those fun-loving boys of the Taliban.

  Of course, this is not to say that all gems come from problematic places in the world.  The difficulty comes when one tries to ascertain where a gemstone comes from.  How does one know its source?
 
  Well, for the most part, the simple truth is that unless you see it come out of the ground, there is no sure answer.  Why?  Because as far as I know, there is currently no sure-fire test that can be done to determine exact origin as well as chain-of-supply.  The technology barely exists, and if it does, it is so expensive to conduct that no one can afford it.  (I will talk about the means of such testing in some future issue, as it is a detailed topic in itself.)  And once a stone is mixed into a parcel of similar stones for sale (which is the case many times), keeping track of every one’s details is simply impossible.
 
  With diamonds, a determination of source is particularly difficult.  It is hard enough to tell if a diamond is synthetic or natural, let alone where it was mined, if it is indeed natural.  With colored gems, like emeralds and rubies, let’s say, the source mining area can be reasonably determined for some stones, but then how does one know if the gem was stolen from the mine, or sold into the trade by some dubious character, or used right on down the line as a means of laundering money?
 
  So the bottom line is this: if you are really worried about buying a "conflict" gemstone, stay away from those gems which have a chain-of-supply so nebulous as to make their true origin unclear.  Ask questions when you are shopping.
 
  There are many beautiful gemstones in the world that come from known, honest sources, which have no connections to a "dark side".
 
   ---  Richard Allen

   Please close this window to return to the newsletter.
   If you have found this page by way of a "Search" on the web, please access our Home Page at www.gemland.com, and explore our site!