The Clean Diamond Trade Act, Public Law 108-19 of 25 April 2003, is the United States federal statute that gives effect to the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme (KPCS) in American law. It is sometimes informally called the 'Kimberley Process Implementation Act'. Together with implementing regulations issued by the Department of the Treasury (Office of Foreign Assets Control) and the Department of Commerce (Bureau of Industry and Security, in regulations at 15 CFR Part 740 and elsewhere), it prohibits the importation into and exportation from the United States of any rough diamond that is not accompanied by a valid Kimberley Process certificate from a participating country.

Background

The Kimberley Process took its name from the 2000 meeting of southern African diamond-producing states held in Kimberley, South Africa, and was negotiated through 2002 in response to the role of rough diamond sales in financing armed conflict in Angola, Sierra Leone, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and elsewhere. The KPCS was endorsed by United Nations General Assembly Resolution 56/263 in March 2002 and entered into operation on 1 January 2003. The United States, as one of the world's largest consumer markets for cut diamonds, was an active negotiator and required domestic legislation to enforce the scheme on its borders. The Clean Diamond Trade Act, signed into law by President George W. Bush, was the result.

Operative provisions

The statute prohibits the importation or exportation of any rough diamond unless it is accompanied by a Kimberley Process certificate, sealed in a tamper-resistant container, and traded only with other KPCS participants. 'Rough diamond' is defined to mean an unworked or simply sawn, cleaved or bruted diamond that has not yet been cut and polished. Polished diamonds, jewellery, and industrial diamond grit fall outside the formal scope of the KPCS and the Act. The Act delegates implementing authority to the President, who in turn assigned it to OFAC and BIS through Executive Order 13312 of July 2003. Civil and criminal penalties mirror those of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and the Export Administration Act, including substantial fines and possible imprisonment for wilful violations.

The System of Warranties

Because the KPCS itself does not extend to polished diamonds and jewellery, the trade developed the System of Warranties (SoW), a self-regulatory chain-of-title statement endorsed by the World Diamond Council. Each invoice in the polished diamond and jewellery supply chain carries a written warranty, in standard form, that the diamonds invoiced have been purchased from sources that are not involved in funding conflict and are in compliance with the United Nations resolutions on conflict diamonds. The Clean Diamond Trade Act does not legislate the SoW directly, but it has been the principal vehicle by which American jewellery retailers have brought their downstream practices into alignment with the underlying conflict-diamond objective.

Practical effect on the United States trade

For an American importer of rough diamonds, compliance with the Act means that every shipment must carry an export certificate from a KPCS participant, must be sealed at origin, and must be presented to U.S. Customs and Border Protection on entry. Failure of any of these elements is grounds for seizure. For the polished and jewellery trade, compliance is principally a question of documentary chain-of-title under the SoW. Major laboratories (GIA, AGS) and trade bodies (Jewelers of America, the Responsible Jewellery Council) have developed parallel standards, including the RJC Code of Practices, that require members to maintain records consistent with the Act's intent.

Reform discussion

The Act is grounded in the original KPCS definition of 'conflict diamond', which is narrowly limited to rough diamonds used by rebel movements to finance war against legitimate governments. That definition has been criticised since the late 2000s as too narrow to capture state-actor abuses, environmental harm, and broader human-rights concerns. The Act itself has not been substantially amended to reflect those critiques, and reform discussion has tended to take place at the international Kimberley Process plenary level rather than through American legislative change. Compliance officers in the United States trade therefore operate within a statute that captures the historical, narrow definition, while market expectations and downstream warranty standards continue to evolve more broadly.