GIA Invests $1.3M to Expand Gem Guide in Africa

RAPAPORT... The Gemological Institute ofAmerica (GIA) has committed $1.3 million to deploying its free gemology guidefor artisanal miners across multiple countries in Africa. The kit will be available to 10,000 miners over four years inMadagascar, Nigeria, Rwanda and Zambia, GIApresident and CEO Susan Jacques said Tuesday. It follows a successful pilot project in Tanzania, which the institute commenced alongside international-developmentorganization Pact in 2016. The guide, which is designed to deliver free, basicgemological and market knowledge in regions where gemstone mining takes place,started as an illustrated, waterproof booklet in English before beingtranslated into Tanzanian Swahili. It is accompanied bya durable plastic tray, which canbe used to sort gems and conduct basic gemological evaluations. Earlier this year, theGIA spent two weeks training more than 1,000 Tanzanian artisanal miners, showing them how to use the guide and tray to evaluate the quality of the rough theymine. Theexpansion of the project, which Jacques unveiled during the ICA Congress in Bangkok, signals a "tremendous step forward" for boththe GIA and Pact. "We know that this investmentwill bring an invaluable benefit to miners, their families and the communitiesin which they live," said Jacques. "We found that for every dollar invested, there was a twelvefold socialreturn that will last years into the future," addedCristina Villegas, technical program manager for Pact's Mines to Marketsprogram. "With their new knowledge, miners improve their income, send theirchildren to school, [and] invest in their mines and their communities." Image: Pact representative Norbert Massay, GIA graduate gemologist Marvin Wambua and GIA library director Robert Weldon explain the gem guide to artisanal miners in Morogoro, Tanzania. (Gemological Institute of America)