Rubies from Myanmar
While some of the world’s best rubies are mined in Myanmar, Tiffany does not purchase any gemstones from the country due to concerns about ongoing human rights violations and a lack of transparency. This began in 2003 when the U.S. forbade the importation of products from the country. In 2008, the passage of the Tom Lantos Block Burmese JADE Act strengthened the original act, prohibiting the import of jadeite and rubies from Myanmar, even if the gemstones were processed in, and exported from, another country.
In 2016, efforts toward democratic reform in Myanmar resulted in the U.S. lifting those sanctions. Prior to determining whether we would purchase gemstones, we felt it was important to engage directly with Myanmar’s mining sector to encourage the adoption of international best practices. We spent more than a year actively exploring whether we thought it was feasible to responsibly source Burmese rubies with a range of stakeholders—including local and international NGOs, national and local governments, and the local mining and gemstone sectors. However, in the midst of our work, violence erupted in Myanmar. Given the severity of the crisis, we decided to suspend our work in the country. We look forward to the time that we may be able to engage in Myanmar once again. Despite the fact that the U.S. sanctions were lifted in 2016, we have not purchased gemstones from Myanmar since the original act was adopted in 2003.
Pictured at left: Brooches with rubies from Mozambique.