Greg Valerio Launches His Book: Making Trouble: Fighting for Fair Trade Jewellery
“Valerio, you’re a natural born trouble-maker. Just make sure you make trouble for the right reasons.”GREG VALERIO was expelled from secondary school with these words ringing in his ears.
It took a little while to find the right cause, but eventually he took on the international jewellery industry– notorious for its blood diamonds, worker exploitation, and endemic corruption.
For fifteen years Greg criss-crossed the globe striving to apply fair trade standards to the jewellery business. From the Arctic circle, via the diamond fields of Sierra Leone to the South American rain forest, he has fought to give the consumer an ethically pure piece of jewellery, and to reward its producers with a fair wage and good working conditions.
Along the way, he has exposed the jewellery industry’s dirty secrets: pollution, child labour, criminality, exploitation, dangerous working practices, and more.
“For me,” said Valerio, “good campaigning meant three simple things: good education that leads to positive action, and then a change in lifestyle that cements campaigning into daily living.”
GREG VALERIO is a fair trade jeweller with a background in human rights and environmental advocacy. He is the founder of CRED Jewellery and co-founder of Fair Jewellery Action. He was named The Observer Ethical Awards Campaigner of the Year in 2011. He was also voted by The Retail Jeweller 2011 as one of the Top 100 innovators in the UK Jewellery Industry.
Maverick, pain in the arse, social entrepreneur, out of the box, radical, passionate, emotional, unmanageable, direct, to the point, breath of fresh air, rebel, visionary, scruffy, non-conformist, looks like a bum, economic terrorist and dangerous bastard have all been used to describe Greg and his commitment to human rights, ecological responsibility and fair trade in the jewellery sector.
Greg is currently working with FAIRTRADE International co-ordinating their International Gold programme and Peace Direct in eastern Congo to support the establishment of a Peace Gold programme with ex-combatants.
He is a regular columnist for The National Association of Goldsmiths Jewellery Magazine, writer, public speaker on Ethics in Jewellery. He initiated and currently serves on the British Jewellers Association and National Association of Goldsmiths ethics working group. He acts as an adviser to the Diamond Development Initiative.
“We stand on the shoulders of voiceless giants who anoint our rubies, sapphires, gold, silver, and diamonds with sweat born from their exploitation, and we casually pretend they do not exist,” he said.
MAKING TROUBLE: FIGHTING FOR FAIR TRADE JEWELLERY is Greg’s inspiring, funny, shocking, serious, and touching autobiography that provokes OUTRAGE, and makes you THINK about any jewellery purchase you might have made but also what must be DONE. Above all, it is the compelling story of one impressive man’s life and work.
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