Brazil develops tool to identify origin of gold

Brazil is designing a new tool to identify the origin of gold mined in the country, which will help buyers find the source of origin of the mineral, allowing them to differentiate legal gold from illegal gold, which is one of the causes of deforestation in the Amazon.

The Brazilian Mining Institute (Ibram) and the University of São Paulo (USP) announced Thursday the creation of the Platform for Responsible Gold Purchasing (PCRO), which will offer service in Portuguese and English on the Internet to identify the origin of Brazilian gold.

“The system allows us to separate legal gold from illegal gold, blood gold, which destroys nature, destroys indigenous peoples, and prostitutes the children of indigenous peoples and nature itself. It allows any buyer to know whether that gold is legal or illegal,” said Ibram’s director general, Raul Jungmann.

“We are removing this illegal gold from the market and, therefore, stifling this activity that is criminal and, most of the time, associated with organized crime,” he added.

The system was developed by USP’s Research Center for Responsible Mining (NAP.Mineração), with funding from WWF and support from the Igarapé Institute.

The platform’s first version was tested by several public and private users, such as the Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office, banks, and jewelry stores.

“This cooperation agreement between USP and Ibram has a civilizing role. It will make it possible to confront and eliminate illegal activities linked to mining, enabling an inclusive mining activity that preserves Brazilian biodiversity and the inalienable rights of native peoples,” said USP Vice-Chancellor Maria Arminda do Nascimento Arruda.

According to the Escolhas Institute, from 2015 to 2020, about 50 percent of the gold traded in Brazil, or 229 tons, came from illegal mines. And from 2010 to 2020, criminal activities multiplied five times in indigenous lands and three times in environmental conservation areas.

“We expect that the control bodies of the Federal Public Ministry, the Central Bank, the National Mining Agency, Receita Federal, and other bodies that exercise control over the gold chain will require mineral producers to go through this platform,” Jungmann concluded.

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