GJ Town India

  Seventh pre-CIBJO Congress 2024 Special Report released   With fewer than five weeks to go to the opening of the 2024 CIBJO Congress in Shanghai, China, on November 2, 2024, the seventh of the pre-congress Special Reports has been released. Prepared by the CIBJO Gemmological Commission, headed by Hanco Zwaan, the report suggests that CIBJO’s more than 300-pages-long Gemmological Laboratories Blue Book come to be used as a best-practices guideline for gem labs worldwide, possibly leading to an international listing of laboratories that comply with those standards.   In most countries today, there is no regulation of what a gem lab is, what methodologies it uses and what standards it applies. What this means in practical terms that any persons wishing to offer gemmological laboratory services, including gem identification and grading, are free to so, irrespective of their background, education and professional training, equipment and reputation. This clearly puts both the indus

Reviews performance of precious metals in 2023-2024 With fewer than nine weeks to go to the opening of the 2024 CIBJO Congress in Shanghai, China, on November 2, 2024, the third of the pre-congress Special Reports has been released. Prepared by the CIBJO Precious Metals Commission, headed by Vaishali Banerjee, the report provides a detailed overview of the gold, platinum, palladium and silver markets during 2023 and much of 2024. The group of precious metals showed differing movement, Vaishali wrote, but the trends that influence prices and demand were generally from outside the jewellery industry. Some were investment-driven and others industrial, with the rapid transformation of electric car manufacturing being a quite decisive factor.    “Investment was the overarching theme for gold in 2023 both for institutional and retail investors,” she noted. “The gold price scored several record highs in the year and has continued the momentum. This is projected to lead to a slowdown in invest