【法国】Responsibility in Jewelry: Between Confusion and Greenwashing?

Currently, the jewelry industry is plagued by persistent confusion between environmental impact and the irresponsible sourcing of gemstones, particularly in the lesser-known colored gemstone market. This perplexity largely stems from a deep lack of knowledge about this market, contrasting with the diamond sector, which is highly industrialized and associated with major environmental issues.

It is crucial to distinguish these two realities: on one side, the diamond industry has transformed into a massive industrial sector, characterized by immense mines and large-scale consumption. On the other, the colored gemstone market remains primarily artisanal (80% of the market comes from artisanal mining activity), operating on small plots with relatively minimal environmental impacts.
This distinction is fundamental as it calls into question direct comparisons between these two markets. While diamond extraction involves heavy industrial methods and considerable ecological damage, similar to other large-scale mining activities such as lithium or beryllium, artisanal mining for colored gemstones often operates on a more modest scale, with limited repercussions on ecosystems.
The most common confusion is conflating responsibility in the gemstone market with the major issues related to environmental preservation.

Beyond the environmental aspect, it is the question of the social and societal dimension of frontline professions that resonates today as a true structural challenge. Workers in colored gemstone mines – from Africa, Asia, and Latin America, where the majority of colored gemstone extraction is concentrated – face difficult and precarious working conditions, requiring particular attention to issues such as the status of women, minimum working age, equipment, etc. This aspect is all the more complex as it is intertwined with economic reality: these mining activities represent the primary source of income and a crucial means of livelihood for miners, even though their remuneration is very low given the effective margins in the jewelry sector. Truly committing would indeed involve better regulating gemstone extraction in mines and also going further by ensuring a fairer redistribution to upstream actors in the chain.

Here too, the term ‘responsibility’ applied to the jewelry sector is problematic because it is difficult to define. Each player in the sector often determines their own criteria for responsibility, which can sometimes be trivialized. Guaranteeing responsible sourcing remains a major challenge for the vast majority of brands because it is directly linked to the lack of traceability.
It represents a major issue in a fragmented artisanal market where information is often lost as the stone moves away from its origin territory. At the same time, limiting the scope of extraction areas, for ethical reasons, can compromise the quality of extracted stones and thus impact the profitability of mining cooperatives. Major houses, due to their production volume, cannot fully guarantee this responsibility, which leads them to adopt a discreet posture on the issue, far from the greenwashing often associated with small and medium-sized brands.
At a time when the EU is toughening its stance on greenwashing with an agreement by MEPs to ban misleading environmental claims, this practice, induced by a lack of market knowledge, leads to brands claiming responsibility often based on blind trust in their suppliers. This approach, while seemingly making things easier, actually avoids finding concrete and sustainable solutions to improve the living conditions of frontline actors in the industry.

In the quest for more environmentally and socially responsible jewelry, several avenues are emerging to improve transparency and ethics in the sector.

Establishing effective traceability at the mine exit, particularly within well-structured cooperatives.

Refusing stones from countries that do not meet ethical criteria, while considering the economic implications.

Encouraging cooperatives to adopt more responsible practices, although this may affect stone quality.
To inspire these changes, the sector could look towards proven models such as those championed by the Alliance for Responsible Mining for gold. This alliance, with its on-site teams and funding, supports cooperatives towards more responsible practices. To enhance traceability, the adoption of technologies such as blockchain could play a key role, with the creation of a dedicated company that would transparently certify the provenance of stones.