Sustainable is a word I see a lot in the jewellery industry, but what does "sustainable" mean when it comes to jewellery and how much do you know about the very dirty side of the jewellery industry?
To understand this complicated issue, we need to go right back to the start of the supply chain and look at how metals are mined. Precious metals including gold, silver, and platinum are mined predominantly in Africa, Asia, and South America.
Precious metals are extracted from the earth using many different methods, Gold and platinum is extracted mostly by relying on small-scale mines, exploiting human resource in terribly dangerous working conditions. Small-scale miners are vulnerable to injury and over-exhaustion, as well as poisoning from poor PPE and handling of toxic chemicals. After a mining area is depleted of metals (precious metals are a limited natural resource) mining sites are often deserted, which can lead to toxic waste land. Damaging nearby ecosystems and communities.
Silver is even more difficult to trace as silver is often mined as a result of mining another material, its the bi-product of multiple industries and as such its routes to the bullion market are even more difficult to trace. The issues we have with the unethical practices of gold mining, some of which mentioned above, are also relevant in the mining of Silver but far harder to identify.
The rough ore material is then processed, often using very toxic chemicals, producing a slurry containing cyanide, to create metal bullion which is sold through traders to international markets. Metal refiners turn the metal bullion into products such as metal sheet or wire and sell these materials to people like me.
Finding ethically mined silver and gold is extremely difficult and to date I have not been able to find a suitable supplier to my small scale business, I wont give up and I keep trying! In recent years we have seen huge improvements in the fairtrade and fair harvesting of Coffee and Cacao, it is my dream that the same begins to happen with precious metals.
There are three widely accepted ways to responsibly source precious metals: Fairtrade, Fair-mined and 100% recycled...as the first two are incredibly elusive the next best alternative is to use recycled metals. This is metal that already exists in the market place and that is refined and reused. Yet, even that isn't completely without flaws. Where is the dirty in that, i hear you say? Or you didn't say but in the interests of transparency I'm going to tell you anyway!
The truth is, the precious metal industry is a tangled web of supply lines, finding the origin of a piece of silver or gold, even recycled is almost impossible. It is highly likely the origin of any recycled gold was an unethical, land destroying, human suffering mine in Asia, or it was the result of a decommissioned nuclear weapon, we really don't know and does recycling it make it ethical? No, I don't think it does but you could argue it is a lot more sustainable than repurchasing fresh unethically mined gold.
However, there are certain practices small batch producers like me can do to make our jewellery sustainable. Since I made my first ever silver ring I have only used EcoSilver and EcoGold from Cookson Gold UK supplier, a recognised ethical supplier to the trade.
Cooksongold have said;
"Cooksongold work with trusted and well established metal refineries to insure that our gold supplies are 100% recycled. Within the wider Heimerle + Meule Group we are able to account for all of our own recycled silver, being completely self-sufficient in this process. 100% of the precious metal in our silver and gold bullion is not newly mined and has been used within another process prior."
Repurposing customers own jewellery and only purchasing from Cooksongold means the sourcing of my precious metals is as sustainable as it can be, for the moment. I've been a plastic free business since 2018, I only use recycled packaging from sustainable paper stocks and this the primary reason I feature sea glass so heavily in my designs as its a waste product made beautiful. I also only use sustainably sourced gemstones ...and that's another blog for another day...
Looking after the planet is a family passion and it extends into every area of our lives, not just in my business. From eco products for the home (check out Kate from Mix Clean Green) to buying all the kids clothes second hand (I haven't bought myself any new clothes decades, thank goodness the 90s are back in fashion!). As sea glass is already classed as a sustainable product, we don't stop at just picking it up from the beach, we leave the beaches cleaner by collecting a whole bag of plastic whilst we are there.
Being a "sustainable jeweller" doesn't start and stop at using recycled metals, it is important but it is a spring board not a full stop.
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