How to Buy Green and Fair Trade Jewelry

When my husband presented me with a diamond engagement ring, I didn’t react like a lot of other girls might have; I was pretty pissed off.

You might scoff at the idea of being angry with such a gift, but I had no way of determining whether or not it was a fair trade piece—or a blood diamond.

Sure, we have the Clean Diamond Trade Act and official bans on importing diamonds from countries where such war diamonds—or diamonds sold to fund bloody wars, usually mined by enslaved people—but can you ever really be sure it’s not the one you’re wearing? After all, though the executive order was issued in 2001 to stop importing from the Sierra Leone, there are plenty of other ways to get them from neighboring African countries—not to mention, what of the diamonds we purchased prior to the ban?

Diamonds aren’t the only pieces of jewelry that have human rights and other concerns attached to them. Gold itself is obtained through what is considered one of the dirtiest practices in the world, with just one gold ring generating 20 tons of waste! They’re also often—about half of the time—mined from the lands of indigenous peoples, destroying their lands and displacing them for nothing more than something shiny to wear on your finger.

But we can choose to not purchase these items and to “go green” with our jewelry. The greenest thing to do, of course, is to make your own. If you’re creative, you might be able to make your own unique designs unlike anyone else’s—a creation truly much more special than something that creates pollution and death.

There are also tons of online websites you can visit where the jewels and baubles are certified green, conflict free, and fair trade. By purchasing something directly from a hardworking artisan and paying fairly for his or her lovely creations, not only are you adorning yourself with something unique and inspiring—you are also buying with your conscience, one of the most powerful things we can do, to support a better world as well as the survival of its artisans.

Such sites include Etsy.com,  Ten Thousand Villages, Wedge Worldwide, and The Rainforest Site. Happy Hippie also lists a directory of dozens of sites where such goods can be purchased.

To find out more about dirty gold practices, click here. And to learn more about blood diamonds, conflict free diamond stores, and to sign the petition against war diamonds, click here.