CIBJO Participates In Hallmarking Convention, Advancing Closer Cooperation

Representatives of the World Jewellery Confederation (CIBJO) participated in the 65th meeting of the Standing Committee of the Hallmarking Convention.The meeting took place in Geneva on September 21, with the intent of advancing closer cooperation between the two organizations.

The Convention on the Control and Marking of Articles of Precious Metals, also known as the “Hallmarking Convention” or “Vienna Convention," is an international treaty between contracting states, that aims to facilitate cross-border trade of precious metal articles. The mandate and scope of the convention is strictly limited to the control of the precious metal content.

The meeting was attended by 53 officials, representing the convention’s 19 contracting states; two applicant states - Sri Lanka and Ukraine; as well as observers from Croatia and Serbia. It was the first time that the CIBJO was represented at this level. CIBJO was represented by its President, Dr. Gaetano Cavalieri, and Michael Allchin, president of CIBJO's Precious Metals Commission.

Cavalieri proposed that the Hallmarking Convention hold a future annual meeting in association with an annual CIBJO Congress. "Hallmarking is at the heart of assuring consumer confidence in precious metals," Cavalieri remarked. "The members of Hallmarking Convention have a vested interest in cooperating as closely as possible with CIBJO and its members."

Michael Allchin observed that the official delegates of the members countries to the convention's meetings are mostly civil servants and government functionaries with little knowledge of or exposure to the various operators in the jewelry supply pipeline, their products and their businesses.

"By holding a Hallmarking Convention meeting in association with a CIBJO Congress, the Hallmarking Convention delegates will have a chance to meet jewelry manufacturers, wholesalers, retailers and designers, i.e. those industry operators whose lives their work affects but with whom they may never have met yet and spoken with before," Allchin concluded.