RJC and Alliance For Responsible Mining Sign Artisanal & Small Scale Mining MOU

November 10, 11 by IDEX Online Staff Reporter

(IDEX Online News) – The Alliance for Responsible Mining (ARM) and the Responsible Jewellery Council (RJC) yesterday announced a Memorandum of Understanding to work cooperatively on advancing their shared objectives. These aims include improving social, environmental and labor practices in artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) and increasing market access for jewelry raw materials produced by ASM communities.

The MOU will formalize ARM and RJC’s collaboration on:

· Standards Cross-recognition: ARM and RJC will collaborate to ensure the standards and modalities of their respective certification systems are mutually supportive. RJC will provide input through membership of ARM’s Technical Committee and ARM will provide input through membership of RJC’s Consultative Panel, and subsequently through the RJC Standards Committee from 2012.

· Supporting ASM: ARM and RJC will collaborate to develop projects to improve social, environmental and labor practices, good governance and the implementation of environmental practices in ASM. To achieve this, ARM and RJC will work together to recruit private, governmental and intergovernmental sponsors.

· Industry Outreach: ARM and RJC will collaborate to increase market awareness and support for jewelry raw materials sourced from well-managed ASM operations.

“RJC welcomes this new formal relationship between our organizations with great enthusiasm. Working together with ARM towards common goals will strengthen our collective efforts towards responsible business practices throughout the jewelry supply chain. We are looking forward to the collaboration and the benefits it will bring to artisanal and small-scale miners and their communities, RJC members and the jewelry industry as a whole,” said Michael Rae, RJC’s chief executive officer.

“ARM believes that strengthening its relationship with the RJC is a key step in building strong collaboration with the industry to jointly embrace the developmental opportunities of ASM. We hope to see more and more ASM communities realize their potential of becoming profitable, socially and environmentally responsible enterprises that participate in global markets and contribute to local development,” said Lina Villa, ARMs acting executive director.

ARM's mission is to set standards for responsible ASM and to support and enable producers to deliver "fairmined" certified metals and minerals through economically just supply chains to the markets, in order to contribute towards the transformation of ASM into a socially and environmentally responsible activity, and to the improvement of the quality of life of marginalized artisanal miners, their families and communities.

The Responsible Jewellery Council is an international not-for-profit organization bringing together more than 340 member companies committed to promoting responsible ethical, human rights, social and environmental practices in a transparent and accountable manner throughout the jewelry industry from mine to retail.

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