Merrell Casting supports certified Fairtrade Gold as a leading UK supplier. Ethical and sustainable practices are at the heart of what we do when manufacturing jewellery in the heart of the Birmingham Jewellery Quarter. Find out how your jewellery business can go the extra mile with Fairtrade Gold below.
What is Fairtrade Gold?
Fairtrade Gold is gold that has been ethically sourced from Fairtrade accredited mines in South America and East Africa. Fairtrade Gold tackles unfair pay, improves working conditions and eradicates child labour. Fairtrade Gold enforces strict requirements for health and safety, chemical handling and environmental protection as well as Child Protection Policies. It also guarantees minimum prices for workers plus a premium to spend on improving businesses and communities.
- Fairtrade Gold is the world’s first independent ethical certification scheme for gold.
- All Fairtrade Gold is sourced exclusively from artisanal and small-scale miners which means your money goes directly into the hands of small communities and not large corporations.
- Miners of Fairtrade Gold must meet standards on safety, worker rights and the environment ensuring fair working conditions for all.
- Fairtrade gold contributes to the UN’s sustainable development goals.
- In 2020, 370kg of Fairtrade certified ore was exported.
Women work at a Fairtrade Gold mine in Tanzania.
Find out more about where Fairtrade Gold comes from here.
Merrell Casting is proud to be a Fairtrade Gold supplier in the UK. We offer jewellery casting in Fairtrade Gold as well as complete jewellery manufacturing in Fairtrade Gold too.
Why Choose Fairtrade Gold?
Buying Fairtrade Gold makes a real difference to the lives of miners, their families and communities. Jewellery with the Fairtrade Gold Stamp looks beautiful and has a beautiful story too.
Buying it means you know the small-scale and artisanal miners were paid a fair price, giving them financial security. They also receive an extra amount of money, the Fairtrade Premium, to invest in building a better future for their families and their communities, through education, medical care or environmental projects.
Some examples of how the Fairtrade Premium has been spent in the past include: building a canteen for workers, protective equipment, and investing in mining infrastructure and equipment to increase productivity. Mines also invest in environmental measures, and some use the Premium to implement measures that reduce the use of chemicals used in gold recovery.
This makes Fairtrade Gold a better choice for people and the planet.
Gold miners at the Limata cooperative, part of CECOMSAP, Ananea, Puno, Peru. Photo: Eduardo Martino (2018).
In 2020 our sister company, Hockley Mint, generated £1,700 in Fairtrade Gold Premium. This premium was earned through the sale of Fairtrade Gold. We’re proud to have loyal customers who support Fairtrade Gold as much as we do.
Our Managing Director, Gary Wroe, explains: “There are about 30 million people involved in small-scale mining around the world, with 100 million people indirectly dependent on mining for their livelihoods. By working with Fairtrade – and with the industry and designers opting to use the metal – mine workers and their families have access to healthcare and education, receive crucial safety training and greater returns for the metals they recover.”
Merrell Casting is a Fairtrade Gold Supplier in the UK.
We are proud to be one of the leading Fairtrade Gold suppliers in the UK. In fact, we were the first British jewellery manufacturer to champion Fairtrade Gold!
We provide jewellery manufacturing in Fairtrade Gold to all our customers. This includes jewellery casting in Fairtrade Gold as well as bespoke jewellery production in Fairtrade Gold through our sister company, Hockley Mint. All Hockley Mint existing jewellery ranges are also available in certified Fairtrade Gold, upon request.
Why does Merrell Casting support Fairtrade Gold?
In 2015 two of our employees embarked on a trip to a Fairtrade Gold mine in Tanzania. Starting their journey at Heathrow Airport, 36 hours and 10,200 kilometres later, our team arrived at the Nsangano Mine in Geita, to meet the team of artisanal miners, and take part in the campaign to launch the first-ever Fairtrade Gold from East Africa.
Our Fairtrade metals are kept separate from others to ensure complete authenticity for our customers.
It was a deeply moving experience for our team as they took in the sights and sounds of their surroundings and experienced the conditions in which small-scale gold miners work every day. They were able to see the positive impact Fairtrade was having on the lives of small-scale miners and we knew that Fairtrade Gold was something Merrell Casting wanted to support.
After his return from Tanzania, our Managing Director, Gary Wroe, said that Merrell Casting was ready to “beat the drum” about Fairtrade Gold and “educate our staff [about the trip] and then roll out the message even further to customers and consumers, to push Fairtrade metals and make a difference to these people lives.”
Welcoming a Ugandan Miner to the Birmingham Jewellery Quarter
And we’ve not stopped there! Shortly after the trip in 2015, our team welcomed Josephine Aguti, a gold miner from Uganda who runs a Fairtrade accredited mine – very similar to the one our team visited in Tanzania – to our factory here in Birmingham Jewellery Quarter.
Just as our team were shown how gold is mined in Tanzania, we showed Josephine how the Fairtrade Gold sourced from East Africa was manufactured into fine jewellery and sold here in the UK.
A worker shows a small piece of gold, which was extracted at the area where the gold-rich soil is washed to separate the gold from the rest, at the mining cooperative Limata, part of CECOMSAP, Ananea, Puno, Peru. Photo: Eduardo Martino (2018).
Josephine’s trip to the UK was as much an educational experience for our team, as it was for her. Josephine presented to our team and was able to tell us how Fairtrade’s support has positively impacted the lives of artisanal mineworkers in East Africa, recalling how she herself began working in the mines at the age of 12 to support her mother and family.
Read more about Josephine’s trip to our factory here.
Fairtrade Ambassadors Scheme
Our sister company, Hockley Mint, also launched the Fairtrade Ambassadors Scheme in 2015 to encourage jewellery retailers and brands to adopt Fairtrade Gold into their core collections and help spread the word to consumers.
Get in touch with our team at [email protected] to find out how your jewellery brand or store can be part of the Fairtrade Ambassadors Scheme, alongside other leading jewellery names.
Jewellery Casting in Fairtrade Gold
We offer jewellery casting in Fairtrade Gold to all of our customers, which means you can choose to have any piece created in ethical Fairtrade Gold.
The process of casting in Fairtrade Gold is exactly the same as with normal gold. However, we keep all Fairtrade metals separate from standard metals to ensure complete traceability back to the mine.
The Fairtrade Gold hallmark inside a pair of wedding bands.
You can choose to use Fairtrade Gold in your own jewellery range in two ways – by becoming a registered Fairtrade Gold Licensee or signing up to be part of the Fairtrade Goldsmith Scheme.
Find out more about how to use Fairtrade Gold here.
As a Fairtrade Gold Licensee, you can also choose to stamp your jewellery piece with the Fairtrade Stamp as a mark of its provenance. This can be applied at your registered Assay Office. You can also have your jewellery stamped with the Fairtrade Stamp, alongside your maker’s mark, at our on-site sub-office of the Birmingham Assay Office.
Merrell Casting believes that no employee should be exploited or endangered for greater profit. All of our customers can choose to cast their jewellery designs in Fairtrade Gold. By choosing Fairtrade Gold, you are supporting a project that has the potential to improve the lives of 100 million people affected by the gold mining industry.
Get in touch with our team to find out how you can start casting in Fairtrade Gold on +44 (0) 121 236 3767.
Together we can help change the lives of artisanal miners across the globe. Let’s work hand-in-hand to eradicate unsafe gold mining practices for good.
