The trends in any sector of fashion are ever-shifting. What was cool last season is out this time. The trends of buying behaviors and preferences change too. The buyers of today are in the best era in the history of ages. We live in the age of information and that gives us all the right to knowledge. Consumers today are much more knowledgeable than they used to be even some years back. We understand certain critical things of products, like where they come from, what are they made of, how they are made, etc. That information takes us a lot closer to the best buying judgments.
Today’s buyers are also socially conscious. They feel a genuine sense of responsibility to the environment. Don’t believe most of the populace has the righteousness? Take a look at the spurt in the demand for ethically sourced diamonds. The buyers of today believe in cheap and best, but they also believe in fair trade. Most of us preach and practice it. That is essentially what leveraged the rise of conflict-free diamonds.
If you are still a couple of paces behind, then conflict free diamonds are those that are not illegally traded for the funding of conflicts like wars, drugs, human trafficking, etc. Simply put, they are diamonds that are ethically sourced. Any diamond that is not a blood diamond is a conflict-free one.
When the news of diamond mining through slaves in central Africa and the Western side of the continent came to us, the global buyers collectively took a stance. They decided to quit purchase of any gemstone the profits from which goes into pumping blood to civil wars and criminal practices.
Since then, the sources of diamonds have been a hotly debated topic. We are more cautious than ever before of the sellers we buy our diamonds from. In 2002, the Gemological Institute of America, which is the authority diamond grading lab in the continental US established what was known as the Kimberly Process.
The object of this process was to analyze the ethics of the suppliers. Through the establishment of this process, GIA has been able to ensure that 99% of the diamonds that find their way into the market today are sourced through sustainable and ethical ways.
