Two of the largest diamond producers in the world have joined hands to increase transparency in an industry that is often marred with allegations of conflict-related exploitation. Russian conglomerate Alrosa has announced that it will join Dutch diamond giant De Beers on its Tracr program to track the precious stones.
Tracr is a blockchain-based pilot program that was developed by De Beers to allay the concerns of diamond customers regarding the status of their purchases. The program tracks the progress of a diamond from initial extraction up to the final retail destination in a transparent manner. De Beers and Alrosa are the largest and second largest producers of diamonds in the world respectively and this move could bring much-needed transparency to the industry.
Alrosa CEO Sergey Ivanov underlined the importance of traceability in the development of the diamond market, building customer confidence and closing information gaps, “enabling people to enjoy the product without any doubts about ethical issues or undisclosed synthetics”.
De Beers CEO Bruce Cleaver agreed that “having a critical level of production on the platform will deliver significant benefits for consumers and diamond industry participants”.
De Beers first announced the development of such a platform last year and subsequently, launched the Tracr program. Other mining companies are also venturing into blockchain-based tracking systems including for rare earth metal tracking in African countries like Rwanda.
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