The only jewelry brand using fair trade precious metals in Taiwan—mittag jewelry

by mittag jewelry

"This is really a memorable day!" James cheered loudly in the studio! This aroused my curiosity and so I tried to look into it. It is indeed something worth knowing! It turned out that mittag jewelry was certified by “Fairmined” and became the first and only jewelry brand using fair trade precious metal in Taiwan in 2020! ! ! Goodness! The company has worked on it for a very long time, and finally realized it, which really needs to be celebrated! (pull party popper)

Actually, many people get to know fair trade starts with coffee (like to know more about fair trade ), but in fact fair trade products are estimated to have more than 30 thousands of varieties, in addition to various agricultural products such as coffee, chocolate, and sugar, as well as cotton, skin care products, and even precious metals such as gold and silver have fair trade certification options! Yes! This article is about to share information about "Fairmined" precious metals.

You may want to ask here, isn't all fair trade called fair trade? That’s right, but there are actually a number of fair trade organizations in the world, and the focus of each organization is also different. Take Fairmined as an example. You can easily know that it is “Fair” and “Mined", the combination of the two words comes to let everyone know that their main projects is the mining industry. Currently, the precious metals provided by Fairmined are gold and silver, which is different from other fair trade organizations, like agricultural products, textile raw materials, or hand crafts... But even so, the goal of making the world fairer and better is the same, and even in many promotional activities, they are often seen to hold events together. Therefore, I would like to take this opportunity to list some well-known and influential organizations for you:

Fairtrade Labelling Organizations International（FLO）
 

World Fair Trade Organization（WFTO）
 

Alliance for Responsible Mining（ARM）（The certification mark is Fairmined)

In addition, it is worth mentioning that Fair Trade is a general term and does not refer to any single organization. However, when it is merged and written as the word Fairtrade, it is usually used in the commodity system for the FLO（Fairtrade Labelling Organizations International）, which is also known as the "Little Man Waving in the Blue Sky Greenland" (the trademark on the left on the above picture).

Gold jewelry is always regarded as a symbol of love, power and wealth. However, have you ever thought about the jewelry we bought, where is the source of the gold coming from? The metal source behind these shiny jewelry is not necessarily as shining and moving as their appearance. You may not know that in many gold mining areas, the local soil is contaminated and the health of the human body is harmed. That is because miners carry out small-scale artificial mining in the absence of safety protection equipment and mining technology. Under this difficult condition, miners must work long hours and use low-cost toxic substances (such as mercury) to extract precious metals. However, these miners sacrificed their health and safety to obtain meager income, and the actual profits fell into the pockets of dishonest vendors, local forces, and warlords. In addition, issues such as  the inequality gender working rights and child labor abuse are generally existed.

Therefore, in order to solve the above problems, for the sustainable development of the natural environment (avoiding the use of chemical extraction, protecting water resources, and complying with international environmental laws), and maintaining the living conditions of miners （reasonable working hours, gender equality, equal pay for equal work, safe working environment, etc.), and to give children the opportunity to receive education to escape poverty, ARM (Alliance for Responsible Mining) sets up "Fairmined" to provide "ethical standards" of gold and silver. In simple terms, it refers to the production process of precious metals, to achieve respect for human rights, cherish the natural environment, fair trade and other ethical norms; treat nature in a friendly manner, and purchase goods at a reasonable price. Under the structure of Fairmined, the supply chain is divided into three certification categories. The first category is the certification of mining sources to ensure that the sources of mining meet the requirements of fair trade. The second category is the certification of precious metal suppliers, and these qualified suppliers directly purchase from the certified mine. The third category is the authorized certification of the brand, to ensure that the good intentions of fair trade can be truly communicated to consumers. Therefore, it can be known that the complete traceability is very concerned by Fairmined and strictly controlled. At present, there are eight qualified mining areas in Fairmined, which are distributed in three countries, Colombia, Peru and Mongolia. It is worth looking forward to that more mining organizations are now working to transform into Fairmined certified mining companies.

However, most consumers have difficulty in knowing the source of the precious metals when buying jewelry, because merchants will try to avoid making you think of negative impressions such as "blood diamonds", so they will not mention the source of the metal. And it also may be manufacturers simply do not know their source of materials and can only mentioned them vaguely. We would like to share with you here, since the establishment of the brand in 2012, mittag jewelry has used precious metal recycled from computer 3C product chips in Taiwan, or precious metals recycled from gold jewelry stores and then refined. This not only helps to reduce the permanent environmental damage caused by mining, but also greatly helps Taiwan's resources upcycling. Today, mittag jewelry has become the only jewelry brand in Taiwan that uses fair trade gold. The production process has added Fairmined certified precious metals, so that the story behind each piece of jewelry you buy is as beautiful as it’s appearances. This is also the brand belief that mittag jewelry has always insisted on being responsible to consumers and truthfully telling the facts.

Every time you spend money, you're casting a vote for the kind of world you want. Therefore, as consumers, always remind ourselves when making purchasements: buy less, choose well, make it last. Before purchasing, you can also actually:

• Proactively ask about the material source: What metal is it made of? Whether it is a cheap alloy that is harmful to the environment and is not worth recycling?
• Choose certified fair trade metals, or precious metals that are recycled and refined.
• Buy good quality jewelry, choose maintained value platinum, gold, silver products. Take good care of the jewelry. Wear it for a long time. When you don't wear it in the future, you can go to the jewelry shop to sell it. After refining, it could rebirth into a new beautiful jewelry, it would last forever.(mittag jewelry products recycling and replacement service)

Looking back over the past year, mittag jewelry did not give up and maintain its efforts, and finally completed the important brand milestone: “to offer fair trade jewelry in Taiwan!”. At such a memorable moment, Fisher said that we must find an opportunity to totally celebrate it (this responsibility is of course handed over to me, who will ensure that a "good" restaurant is found, and "well spend money" to recover Taiwan's economy with consumption XD); But at this moment, in the studio, we toast with Fairtrade coffee to commemorate this moving moment (with tears in my eyes).

At present, although mittag jewelry is the "only" Taiwanese brand that uses Fairmined gold, mittag jewelry hopes to officially take down the word "only" in the future, because the goal of making the environment sustainable should not be limited due to commercial competition. mittag jewelry believes that "If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together." In order to go far together, we sincerely invite you to join us and move forward hand in hand. Please feel free to contact us through the following mail "mittagnatureme@gmail.com" and let us help you to join the fair trade family.

#Fairtrade 
#Fairmined
#FLO 
#WFTO 
#ARM
#EthicalJewelry

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