Sustainability is defined as: “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” In other words: leaving our children a world that they can live in.

We must understand that all our care and effort to bring up our children healthy and provide them with the best possible education will be useless, if they do inherit from us a shattered world.

If we are looking at where we are today, 35 years after the United Nations demanded a change of our society and a development of the economy towards sustainability, then we cannot help but getting scared:

Current scientific data shows, that there are planetary boundaries. If we overstep such boundaries irreversable change will be initiated that puts the survival of the human species together with all other species at a very high risk. We know now, without leaving room for any doubt, that our species has already overstepped 3 planetary boundaries to the point of irreversable change: We already have lost too much biodiversity (species of plants and animals) to get back to a healthy system. We have already overstepped the use of nitrogen and phosphorus in our agricultural system leading to unpredictable and irreversable change in our ecosystems.

Even more worrisome is, that there are two more factors where we are about to overstep those planetary boundaries: Our use of land ecosystems (or better said our destruction of them) has come to a level that is going to become irreversably unsustainable within years from now. And climate change is progressing so fast that if we do not manage to reduce the global use of fossil fuel in 50% within the next 8 years till 2030, we will overstep this planetary boundary too, getting into unknown irreversible high risk territory where we just can´t foresee yet the catastrophic change that this will mean for the entire world.

In summary: the time for governments, for companies of any sector and for every human being to keep putting a blind eye to this and act as if nothing was wrong is OVER. Everybody, we as a company, every worker in our company, every one of our clients – we all together, should act, if we truly love our children.

I am aware of the fact, that this still is not an easy message to convey, that change will be hard and that there are so many excuses not to do anything.

But simply put: the time for excuses is over too.

I cannot hide the fact, that since we started talking to possible commercial clients about ethical mining, ethical production and environmental conservation, some of them rejected our products because they were of the opinion that their customers would not pay the additional costs of being ethical. I remember one crystal shop owner who literally answered me, that if the shipping costs from India are cheaper than ours she would not care about the fact that the crystals were produced under unfair and abusive sweatshop conditions.

The fact that you are reading these lines, tells me that you are different. And I would like to congratulate you, dear reader, that you have an interest in finding out, if you could cooperate with us and provide your clients with crystal products that are ethically AND environmentally friendly.

We have decided to take the leap of faith into the will of our crystal-shop clients and the world´s consumers, to make this required change to reach a sustainable world. 

So let´s start doing something.

Our Carbon Footprint 2021

By now, there is no room left for doubt about the fact that human induced climate change is going to be the most dramatic natural force changing the face of our planet and gravely affecting not only the human species existence but the entire planets biodiversity. Science leaves it crystal clear to us: If the global human society on all its levels does not reduce the use of fossil fuels in 50% over the course of the next 8 years we will pass the planetary climate change boundary and march into unknown high risk terrain that will harshly impact the quality of life of all future generations, meaning: our children, theirs and so forth.

Put in front of such a daring challenge there is not a single day left to loose for all of us to make a change. Here is what we do and how you can help:

Mining, transport, lapidary work and final shipping to your home, all these steps carry environmental impacts caused by the use of water, energy and other resources.

A carbon footprint analysis aims to translate all the impacts being generated from the first step of mining to transport of rough rock, production of crystal products, international shipping of those goods to commercial clients and waste production along the entire chain into one measuring unit, in this case the amount of climate gas CO2 (measured in tons of weight of the gas) being emitted into our atmosphere.

Gemrock Peru is most likely the first crystal company in the world measuring its carbon footprint: Our carbon footprint in 2021 was 49.56 t of CO2 emissions.

If we look at where the biggest part of the impact is in our company, then we can see that 46 % of our CO2 emissions are caused by dealing with the garbage produced along the entire production chain. This is quite normal for a production company that converts raw material in finished products. One has to bear in mind that every tool, every product and every piece of raw material one uses along the production chain at some point of its product life will become garbage. And then we will use energy to deposit this garbage in land-consuming landfills.

The production of the materials used for our production make up for 23 percent of our carbon footprint. This does not only include the process of mining the rough rock, but of course the production of all other materials we are using like steel tools, packaging materials, etc.

International shipping counts for 21 % of our carbon footprint. It is obvious that we would have such a high percentage of shipping impact given the fact, that we are exporting 100% of our products and we ship them all over the world.

Forestry resources (basically paper and cart box packaging materials) as well as the use of freshwater make up together for 9 % of our carbon footprint and electricity use is 1 %. The use of services (accounting, banking services etc.), as well as the use of restaurants and hotels during business trips is negligible and below 1 percent of our footprint. The latter is so low because in 2021 there were no international gem shows. If our company would have participated for example in a gem show in Tucson our carbon footprint on travel would have been much bigger.

Based on this analysis we now can initiate specific measures in order to reduce this footprint a little more each year. However the only way to reach zero carbon emissions is to plant trees in other places, which extract CO2 from the atmosphere and this way do eliminate the emissions caused by us.

How to get a carbon-neutral crystal ?

.5Even if we will make a continuous effort to reduce our CO2 emissions, it will be impossible to get to zero. Therefore the only way to create a carbon-neutral crystal product is to plant trees. Trees clean our air by extracting CO2 from the air, incorporating the Carbon (C) into the growth of their wood and expulsing breathable oxygen (O2) into the atmosphere.

A mature tree extracts every year 25 kg CO2 from the atmosphere. This means we require 1981 mature trees to completely eliminate our annual carbon footprint. With an average of 500 trees per hectare, we need approximately 4 hectares of forest.

So how much money would we have to charge on top of our products to finance a reforestation project and completely eliminate the carbon footprint?

If you, as a crystal company, want to buy from us a carbon-neutral, environmental friendly crystal, you would have to add only 1.5 cent to every USD of the total amount you pay us (wholesale price plus shipping). This is just 1.5 % additional cost in order to eliminate your crystals climate change impact completely.

What we are proposing to you:

How you could manage the cost:

As a crystal business you have three options to manage the cost:

1.) Incorporate the 1.5 percent as a cost factor and increase your final price in order to transfer the cost to your client.

2.) Keep your final price the same and discount from your profits

3.) Take solution 2 but give your client the option that we give you: Choose to pay the regular price (and leave you with a higher cost) or pay a carbon-positive price that is increased in 1 cent per USD of retail price. As you are selling at a higher price than we, you would need only 50% of your clients paying carbon-positive to recover the entire extra cost paid for tree planting.

There is an easy solution to that:

We are offering you to calculate your carbon footprint using the same scientifically sound carbon footprint method, which was used by us.

Normally a carbon footprint calculation would cost you thousands of USD, if done for a company. We can help you with that for a ridiculously small cost of 249.- USD. Of course this means you have to do some homework and provide us with the required data that we need to calculate your footprint. But that´s all.

Once you know your companies carbon footprint you can provide your clients with the opportunity to buy all your crystal carbon neutral.

In order to invest your carbon footprint money you have two options:

1. You can donate them to our reforestation project, and save Peruvian rainforest.
2. Or you can donate them to any other reforestation project all around the world. As long as trees are planted somewhere on this planet, we are all going to be happy about the success.

Calculate your companies carbon footprint

Gemrock Peru: Social and Environmental Responsability

Why choose Gemrock?