For Women. Forever.
Upholding the inherent dignity, value and potential of women is a very important aspect of a De Beers Forevermark diamond. Sharing De Beers Group’s Building Forever 2030 Goals, De Beers Forevermark is committed to accelerating equal opportunities. Our vision is to accelerate economic inclusion and support diverse voices to help shape the future of our business, communities and society.
De Beers is pleased to extend its global partnership with UN Women for a further five years, joining the newly-formed HeForShe Alliance. In doing so, it has committed to increasing the representation of women in technical and leadership roles within its business, as it works towards achieving gender parity across its workforce by 2030 as part of its Building Forever sustainability goals.
As part of the deepened partnership, De Beers Group will invest an additional US$3 million to extend the AWOME (Accelerating Women-Owned Micro-Enterprises) program in Southern Africa, building on the $3 million funding the Group committed in 2017 to supporting women and girls in its partner countries. Since then, the program has provided tailored business training and mentorship to more than 1,000 women entrepreneurs in Botswana, Namibia and South Africa, as well as qualifying over 50 local trainers to ensure the program’s sustainable future. The additional funding will expand the program and enable De Beers’ journey towards achieving its Building Forever goals, of supporting 10,000 women micro-entrepreneurs by 2030.
De Beers has been a UN Women partner since 2017. Since then it has accelerated the advancement of women across its organization by increasing the appointment rate into senior leadership from 22% to 40% and representation of women in senior leadership from 17% to 30%.
In addition, De Beers has granted more than 50 scholarships to young women in Canada to pursue STEM opportunities and engaged more than 900 girls in Southern Africa have taken part in STEM workshops, ideations’ and mentorship programs in partnership with the award winning organization, WomEng. Last year De Beers committed to extend this work, setting a Building Forever Goal of engaging a further 10,000 girls in STEM.
De Beers Group’s initial commitment has also seen the company develop and roll out its Inclusive Marketing Guidelines across its consumer brands to ensure all campaigns are a positive force for gender equality.
Bruce Cleaver has been a UN Women HeForShe Champion since 2017 and will continue to be a Champion over the coming five years, spearheading and advocating transformative change across De Beers, as well as the wider diamond value chain and beyond.
De Beers Forevermark, as part of the De Beers Group, is proud to be part of this initiative. It is our responsibility to do all we can to make sure every diamond we discover helps the generations to come and Building Forever has the power to support a brighter future in essential, sustainable, beautiful ways.
Healthcare and Education
Good healthcare and education are essential for the social and economic development of local diamond-producing communities, and particularly for women. The De Beers Group helps to provide healthcare and education for its employees working in these communities, as well as their families and other local inhabitants. The hospitals at Orapa and Jwangeng mines in Botswana are run in partnership with Botswana’s Ministry of Health, and double as district hospitals, providing healthcare and education to local communities.
It is imperative to the De Beers Group that we protect our employees and other local inhabitants of diamond-producing areas from HIV, AIDS and associated illnesses, such as tuberculosis, the consequences of which can fall heavily on women. We protect all of our employees and their family members through a free and highly effective program of prevention, treatment and support.
These testing, treatment and outreach services provided through hospitals in diamond communities have helped reduce the fatality of HIV-positive employees in Debswana from 31% in 1996 to less than 1% in 2016.
The De Beers Group uses a similar partnership model for education in Southern Africa, where its schools accept students from the surrounding areas, regardless of whether or not their parents work in mines operated by the De Beers Group. In South Africa, for example, we are immensely proud of the more than 3,000 students who have benefited from the Khula Weekend School, which helps children aged between 15 and 18 prepare for a professional career or higher education. Boasting an outstanding academic record, the school recently expanded with new centers in Soweto (University of Johannesburg), Vanderbijlpark (Vaal University of Technology), and Alldays and Musina in Limpopo.
Supporting Women in Business
De Beers Forevermark supports the De Beers Group’s variety of initiatives to help women become successful entrepreneurs in their own right, with the assistance of development funds like Zimele in South Africa and Namibia, and Tokafala in Botswana. These programs provide people in diamond-producing communities with the funding and mentoring they need to grow their own businesses.
Protecting Nature’s Beauty
De Beers Forevermark, as part of the De Beers Group is committed to protecting forever by taking steps to preserve and protect habitats, their species and the wider natural world throughout the diamond producing regions of Southern Africa and Canada.
DiscoverMark of Integrity
De Beers Forevermark diamonds only come from carefully selected mines that are committed to high business, social and environmental standards.
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Responsibly Sourced
Sourcing De Beers Forevermark diamonds responsibly means that throughout their journey from rough to polished diamonds, particular care has been taken to ensure responsible business practices, to support for the advancement of women and to protect the natural world, which is the ultimate source of our diamonds.
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Responsibly Sourced
Every De Beers Forevermark inscribed diamond is conflict free, untreated and completely natural
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