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Provenance Provision Satisfies RJC's Chain of Custody Requirements
Jul 19, 2015 7:23 AM
By Rapaport News
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RAPAPORT... The Responsible Jewellery Council (RJC) said that the provenance claims provision in its 2013 Code of Practices should satisfy a diamond company’s need to trace its diamonds across the distribution chain. The comment came in the response to an email from Rapaport News requesting comment for an article exploring whether a sufficient audit trail could be implemented to support a chain of custody for diamonds. That article, “Diamond Hallmarking Seeks to Make Its Mark,” was published on Friday,
Rapaport News: Are there plans to introduce chain of custody for diamonds?
RJC: RJC’s chain-of-custody standard has tremendous pickup in the metals sector with 29 members certified on both the code of practices and chain-of-custody standards. Some of the diamond contingent of RJC’s membership supported chain of custody, while others were struggling with implementation issues. So, RJC took a different approach and performed a wide consultation with its diamond membership, a specially formed India working group, as well as external stakeholders, for the inclusion of a provenance claim in the development of its 2013 code of practices. The result was a provenance claim provision that has satisfied a broad cross section of RJC’s membership that wish to make a claim about the provenance of their product.
The 2013 code of practices introduced a new provision on provenance claims. This new provision enables members that wish to make provenance claims to have those claims audited as part of their RJC code of practices certification. The code does not require members to make provenance claims.
Rapaport News: What are the main issues and challenges preventing an industry-wide chain of custody being introduced?
RJC: First, a company must be convinced there are relevant, valuable financial and marketing benefits to implement a chain of custody for their company. Next, it needs to evaluate how effectively it can work with their business partners through the supply chain to make this happen. These two points were the drivers for RJC to propose the provenance claim provision as a viable option for the industry to make claims about the products they trade that ultimately reach consumers.
Rapaport News: Would a company's hallmarking initiatives be taken into account in being certified by the RJC?
RJC: Yes, the process, or chain, that is inherent in a hallmarking initiative would be identified by an auditor as a demonstration of due diligence.
Rapaport News: What added value does RJC certification provide a company?
RJC: RJC’s code of practices is a world-class standard for the jewelery supply chain. It was created by industry for industry to ensure a wide range of supply chain issues, including business ethics, human rights, social and environmental performance are adhered to by the distinguishing feature of independent third party audit. Benefits of RJC membership include:
Demonstrating due diligence: RJC certification is the perfect tool for demonstrating due diligence to various stakeholders, including governments, banks, suppliers and customers.
Manage risk, protect reputation: The RJC certification process helps members identify risk areas and it gives practical tools for managing those risks to avoid future hazards.
Provenance claim: The provenance claim provision in the 2013 code of practices has opened up some useful marketing opportunities in the diamond supply chain – it can be used to support claims of no synthetics and also about sources e.g. buying from certain producers.
Marketing: RJC certification helps Members to market their businesses to their customers. We increasingly get queries from companies who not only wish to demonstrate their business behavior but also want to show they source responsibly.
Corporate social responsibility: This has become a big issue in the jewelery industry. RJC certification can be used as a turn-key corporate social responsibility tool to tune up a member’s business and present it to an international audience via the RJC website.
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Tags:
diamonds, jewellery, Jewelry, Rapaport, Rapaport News, RJC
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