EMPOWERING ARTISANAL MINERS THROUGH BASIC GEMOLOGICAL EDUCATION; HOW GIA TEACHES PRINCIPLES OF ROUGH GEMSTONE SORTING AND EVALUATING TO AID THE ARTISANAL MINING COMMUNITY

Gemstone mining in most of the world remains a largely artisanal endeavor, and many artisanal miners are ignorant of the most basic ideas of gemstone formation, deposition, and valuation. This knowledge gap places these miners at an economic disadvantage and at risk of financial exploitation. To fill this knowledge gap the Gemological Institute of America (GIA) has developed an educational outreach program aimed at the artisanal gemstone mining community. We present the accompanying “textbook” design, course content, previous success in Zambia and Tanzania, and educational value to artisanal gemstone mining communities of this outreach program. We teach artisanal miners about rough gemstone valuation and sorting to create added value of the gem parcels they mine. Manufacturing a polished gemstone can increase the value of a single gemstone by 100X its initial value. However, this program explains how sorting rough gemstones by color, shape, and size, can also add up to 20X the initial value of gemstone parcels. This is an important potential revenue gain for artisanal miners. These communities are mired by low production and revenue generation, and therefore have low potential savings to reinvest in mining or to improve their lives and communities. Through education GIA can provide artisanal miners the tools to sort and evaluate rough gemstones, resulting in higher sale revenues within their respective communities. At the community level it will improve purchasing power. At the regional level, supporting artisanal mining communities will foster increased demand for local goods and stimulate gem manufacturing sectors. GIA has published “Sorting Gem Rough: A Guide for Artisanal Miners” and is currently developing “Sorting Diamond Rough: A Guide for Artisanal Miners” which are used as vehicles to teach colored stone and diamond formation, deposition, valuation, sorting, and environmental remediation. To support these educational programs, GIA is evaluating the use of local satellite imagery and is assessing knowledge-based questionnaires from communities before and after delivery of these programs. These metrics of social return will support the validation of this educational outreach activity.