Better Without Mercury

It isn’t everyday we have the opportunity to prevent pollution from toxic mercury.

Until miners from the Fortaleza Mining Association in Colombia achieve their mercury free goal, Christina T. Miller sustainable jewelry consulting and our partners will continue to raise the funds necessary to complete this clean-up.

This initiative is being hosted on the Ethical Metalsmiths website so that your support (of course you are invited to participate) is tax deductible.

Our overall fundraising goal is $65,000. And between now and the end of December, we are raising the $9,000 required for the first phase, contracting an excavation company to prepare the area where the mercury contaminated soil will be permanently stored.

FOR JEWELERS:

Mercury pollution plays a major role in the darker side of our materials. The Better Without Mercury project offers an opportunity for your company to be a part of the solution.

• Design funding this project into % “give back” program

• Donate a % of revenue for a specific period of time or from a particular line

• Invite your customers to round up in support

• Share the project’s social media campaign @betterwithoutmercury on your own

• Increase your awareness of the toxic neurological effects of mercury

JOIN US!

Chicago Responsible Jewelry Conference - Oct. 13 - 14, 2017

Radical Collaboration . . . it is happening.

The inaugural Chicago Responsible Jewelry Conference took place Oct. 13-14, 2017 at Columbia College, Wabash Ave., Chicago, IL. The event, created by jewelry designer, Susan Wheeler Geraghty in collaboration with Andrea Hill and in partnership with Ethical Metalsmiths, brought together a highly focused group of people dedicated to all facets of a responsible jewelry practice.  

I delivered the very last presentation, a summary of the conference itself, right after a screening and discussion of the film Sharing the Rough and before the well earned cocktail reception.

Some highlights:

• A successful, socially and environmentally responsible jeweler, offered customers to those who needed the business (their business is thriving).

• A Tanzanian gemstone miner inspirationally participated by phone when all other technological solutions failed providing insight into his day-to-day.

• A rutilated quartz miner, determined to plan a post-mining, permaculture community in Brazil.

• How big jewelry companies are leveraging their size to increase transparency across the industry.

• A panel of independent jewelers shared their diverse responsible sourcing strategies and their challenge to suppliers to make more traceable products available.

• Silicosis, berylliosis - two life threatening diseases that still plague gem cutters globally and a plea to help.

We each hold a vision of what a fair and thriving society for all could look like and also a very crisp and clear version of the opposite. And while we can generally agree that some societies do seem to experience fairness and happiness, we don't really believe life is fair or even safe for a whole lot of people and places around the world. 

Let’s work for fairness.

See you at next year’s conference.