Azuay artisan jewelers are affected [2008-05-05]

Many shops have to close their doors, do not reach to cover production costs.
Many shops have to close their doors, do not reach to cover production costs.

The cessation of mining activity, large-scale, in Ecuador, has affected them directly to jewelers and handicrafts, as well as explained Hernan Asmal, chairman of the Association of Jewelers of Azuay.

You indicated that it has become almost impossible to get the gold at a reasonable price, making the competition against large companies producing jewelry becomes even more difficult. Asmal predicts that the big traders who are hoarding all the gold and becomes difficult to obtain material for craftsmen do their work, bringing several goldsmiths have to leave their shops because they can not cover production costs.

The leader said that the State must be through some of its institutions, who established a plan to help craft jewellers get the ore to a normal price, as this may continue with their production.
The cost of materials including increases in a matter of hours, which does not allow jewellers to provide resources to be invested. In Azuay, most goldsmiths buy gold to vendors who receive the mineral areas as: Ponce Enriquez, Portovelo, Zaruma, Bella Rica, Macas, among others. So here also feel the effect of intermediation. Asmal noted the mining concessions to foreign companies, citing as an example, the Nambija area, where companies operating abroad.

"From the raw material extracted from that area that we do not know if it is something for Ecuadorians," he said the craftsman from Cuenca. To compensate for damages by the high price of gold, Asmal considers it desirable for the State to exercise greater control over the entry of foreign goods, jewelry in question, therefore argues that much has affected the arrival of jewelry from the outside, the same as in his opinion, are of low quality and made with little resistant materials.

Everything is a chain

In most workshops, machines that are rented to other workers performing the process of finished jewelry, have had to be sold or stored so that they will not be damaged.

As Hernan Asmal said, "everything is a chain" because the absence of the ore, jewelers do not produce, does not employ and not supplying the local trade. Asmal explained that, years ago, the high demand for Mother's Day covered the amount of income to sustain most of the year.

Many jewellers have had to make an investment of up to $ 30,000, money that can not be recovered. According to Asmal said, the most viable option is to sell machines to try to at least salvage something in the money invested.

Still believe in jewelry

Hernan Asmal, chairman of the association of jewellers of Azuay, expressed satisfaction with the great reception took the course for initiation of jewellers, who organized with the support of the Centre for Economic Conversion (Cree). "There was a group comprised of youth and maturity," he said the leader.

He explained that 2 students in the mornings working in their offices and in the afternoon attending the courses, which shows that the Azuay still have a hope of field work in the area of jewelry.

On the other hand Asmal believes that the quality has been lost in armed jewelry by hand, ie, manual work, which was described as "real art", not detract from the work of jewelry industry. (CSM)