Enhanced supply chain transparency in gold production

Sustainable investments have seen a sharp rise in interest among private investors in recent years, especially in Europe. According to the Sustainable Investment Barometer by J.P. Morgan Asset Management, for example, two-thirds of German investors are interested in ESG-compliant investments. Even in the case of gold, which plays an important role in investor portfolios as a stabiliser, increasing focus is being placed on a preferably small ecological footprint. With a far-reaching voluntary commitment on the part of the gold industry, the fulfilment of this demand will henceforth be easier to trace.

33 major gold producers to disclose their supply chains

All 33 members of the World Gold Council, which are among the largest producers of the precious metal with an annual output of around 1,300 tonnes of gold, have committed, in a declaration dated 18 September 2023, to publish, without exception, the names and addresses of all partner companies that process the mined gold – right up to the finished gold bar in wholesale and retail. Going forward, this will make it easy to track whether all downstream companies, e.g. those refining the mined gold, have a Good Delivery certification.

Data provision for the “Gold Bar Integrity” platform

In early 2022, the London Bullion Market Association LBMA and the World Gold Council had already launched a pilot project with the goal of  enabling a complete and unambiguous determination of the origin of every single newly produced gold bar using block chain technology – the “Gold Bar Integrity Programme”. For this purpose, a platform was created to manage all the necessary data. The members of the World Gold Council recently committed to providing their production information, thus creating the starting point for the subsequent refining and supply chain of the gold they produce. Once this is established, the origin and ESG compatibility of no less than 34 per cent of all mined gold would be fully traceable. Add to this is the share of recycled gold within the total gold supply, which accounted for around 35 per cent in the first half of 2023.