One of the laziest and most misleading ‘sustainability pledges’ we have seen recently is this ‘effort’ from Annoushka, supposedly backed up by misleading claims like this when it comes to carbon emissions and the effect of using recycled gold to make jewellery.
As with many other jewellery companies now desperately trying to make their inherently destructive and unsustainable industry look better in the light of increased scrutiny when it comes to sustainability, Annoushka claim to be using a large percentage of recycled gold to make their jewellery.
Making jewellery out of recycled gold does not reduce the need for mining and does nothing to stop climate change. If anything it increases gold mining as people are encouraged to consume gold whilst thinking they are not in any way responsible for the damage that gold mining does.
What's so blatantly misleading about this particular pledge is that ts framed as if this is some type of reaction to the climate crisis and thus a change of policy has been enacted. However, this just isn't true and most jewellery already contains a large percentage of recycled gold and it always has. People have never thrown away gold and there is a long-standing and highly optimized industry and infrastructure involved in gold recovery and recycling. This is because of golds status as a valuable commodity and not because of sustainability.
In short, Annoushka is doing absolutely nothing about sustainability and nothing at all to change the industry they are reliant upon, the gold mining industry.
As with any jeweller, Annoushka could use Fairtrade or Fairmined gold in their designs, both of which have been available since 2011, however, they have decided not to.
For more than 10 years Annoushka have had the opportunity to help small scale miners to extract gold in a safer and more environmentally friendly way, but they have chosen not to.
More to come
