Recently, reviewing a document on standards and principles for fair trade gold, I have been struck by an underlying bias toward democratic processes. The assumption is that democratic decision making is superior to all others. Ironically, the democratic approach has often been used to undermine indigenous communities—the very groups which fair trade is supposed to

~ Editorial comment by Marc Choyt In my previous post, I discussed how nearly every civil society would consider Zimbabwe diamonds as conflict diamonds, given the widespread documentation of atrocities that have taken place there. Yet these diamonds from Zimbabwe, are already being openly sold to diamentiers in India at 25% under market outside of

~ By Marc Choyt, Publisher Sometimes reading all the criticism about Kimberley Certification Process (KPC) feels like flogging a dead horse. KPC is the regulatory body that assures only “conflict free” diamonds enter the supply chain. Zimbabwe has been the hot topic for several months now and the critical debate recently has been whether or