In Tanzania, Kenya, and beyond, Pact and partners build responsible gemstone supply chains

For Salma Juma Mdoe, making a living was never easy. For years, her main source of income has been gemstone mining in Tanzania’s Umba Valley, a gem-rich area in northeast Tanga Region. Like many gemstone miners, Salma has never been part of a big operation. She is an artisanal miner; using basic tools, she mines gems such as tourmalines, sapphires, and amethysts that eventually make it to jewelry consumers across the world. 

Today, however, the 48-year-old mother is financially stable. It’s a change that Salma credits to Moyo Gems, a Pact-led program that is empowering gemstone miners in Tanzania, Kenya, and beyond to earn much more for their gems and to mine in ways that are safer, more efficient, and environmentally responsible. While the program focuses on women miners, Moyo Gems also includes men. 

Salma began her Moyo Gems journey by participating in a training organized by Pact and Gemological Institute of America (GIA) in 2016. 

“The skills I gained include how to evaluate gems, distinguishing between high-quality gems and those with lower value. Before, I used to sell gems without considering their quality. Now I can assess the quality and value,” Salma says.

“The training also taught us essential safety measures, like wearing face masks, boots, helmets, and gloves to protect ourselves.” 

Soon, Salma began participating in Moyo Gems Market Days, a miner-to-market model that allows artisanal and small-scale miners to sell gemstones directly into transparent, equitable, and formalized markets, reducing reliance on informal and exploitative trading networks. The model empowers miners to engage directly with buyers under clear rules, pricing processes, and traceability mechanisms, significantly increasing miners’ incomes.

Salma also began taking part in a Moyo Gems-supported WORTH group, a community banking model built by Pact that has helped more than 1 million women around the world to save money, access credit, and gain skills in entrepreneurship. Salma learned about diversifying her income sources, and now, in addition to mining, she runs a successful side business raising goats. 

“Before, I was in a difficult financial situation,” Salma explains. Now, she can afford everything she needs and more. “Through this project, I was able to pay for my children’s school fees.”

Salma beams as she shares that her daughter is now working on a master’s degree in education, once an unimaginable dream, because Salma is able to pay for her tuition and housing. 

“This is what’s possible when gem miners have gemstone knowledge and access to fair markets,” says Pact’s Norbert Massay, who manages Moyo Gems in Tanzania.

Pact and our partners have been growing Moyo Gems since 2016, beginning with a pilot program in partnership with GIA that provided basic gemology training and tools for gemstone miners in Tanzania. Trainings have now reached more than 1,500 miners in Tanzania and Kenya.

In 2019, Moyo, which means “heart” in Kiswahili, held its first Market Day. Since then, over 50,000 gemstones have been sold through Moyo Market Days, including more than 8,000 in 2025, demonstrating continued strong demand and the scalability of the approach. Through the Moyo Gems model, miners receive 95% of the export value of their gemstones, while local brokers receive 5% for sorting, valuation support, and facilitation.  

Moyo Gems has been established as a recognized gem market in the Tanga region of Tanzania, operating in alignment with national mining and export regulations in and close collaboration with the government’s Regional Mining Office. In Kenya, where the model has expanded, Moyo Gems is recognized as one of the most successful mining programs, largely due to its provision of reliable market access for miners. 

This cornerstone of the Moyo program is implemented in partnership with traders ANZA Gems, Nineteen48, Maison Piat, and A Beautiful Story, and with women miner associations including The Association of Women in Energy in Kenya and the Tanzania Women Miners Association. This collaboration ensures technical support for miners as well as governance oversight, which is key for building sustainable and transparent supply chains across the region. 

Moyo Gems has also been supported by donors such as World Bank, Brilliant Earth, SCS Global, and the Netherlands Enterprise Agency. 

“With the Moyo Gems model, we have shown that another way is possible,” Massay says. “Artisanal miners can earn real incomes, supply chains can become even stronger, and gemstone consumers can be confident that their gems were produced responsibly.”

Moyo Gems has also layered on additional women’s economic empowerment and inclusion components through WORTH, which brings together groups of 20 to 25 people to save money, access credit, and start small businesses. Members are required to make small savings deposits at weekly meetings, and when groups’ funds grow large enough, members may begin taking loans, which they use to start businesses.  

In Tanzania, there are 42 active WORTH groups with more than 700 members, including 75% women. In Kenya, the program has 21 WORTH groups.  

The WORTH groups serve as a key sustainability strategy, providing long-term financial inclusion, collective accountability, and a platform for ongoing training and leadership development. Through the groups, women increase their incomes, assume leadership roles, participate in decision-making, and strengthen household and community resilience.

For Elizabeth, a gemstone miner in Tanzania, the results have been life-changing. 

“We were taught that we should be involved in businesses beyond mining,” Elizabeth says. “Now I’m in the commercial motorbike transportation system. I was afraid before, but not anymore because of the skills training.” 

About Moyo Market Days, she says, “We’ve been selling a lot more than we used to on the street or other markets. My capital keeps growing every day. Us women have a lot of power in our homes now.” 

David Swai, 62, also a gemstone miner in Tanga, says he mines more efficiently and safely now, thanks to Moyo Gems, and he is able to sell more of his gems at better prices. 

“It’s crucial for us to gain the knowledge, because it brings progress. Now we can sell. We can send our children to school.” 

He notes that Moyo WORTH groups have had a big impact for his neighbors. Local groups have done so well that they decided to pool their resources to begin making grants to meet community needs.

“They bought school uniforms for children facing hardship,” David says. “The [WORTH] women have taken on that responsibility.”

Moyo Gems also includes program components that are bolstering mining formalization, compliance, and occupational safety, as well as environmental sustainability. Regional government officers applaud Moyo Gems for driving wider regional economic transformation by providing accurate, detailed gemstone market data and revenue through the formal export process, which includes officially valuing and packaging gemstones and accompanying documentation. In Kenya, Pact is conducting research to estimate greenhouse gas emissions of gemstone mining, generating evidence to lay the basis for carbon offset initiatives.  

Women mining associations have played crucial roles at every step as Moyo Gems has evolved, ensuring a community-led approach. They support Market Days, engage in training, and provide additional programmatic support, enabling more than 600 miners across Tanzania and Kenya to take part in Moyo Gems. 

“We’ve built a holistic program that is driving lasting change. We are transforming artisanal mining from an informal survival activity into a regulated, transparent sector that supports women’s livelihoods, strengthens local governance, and drives sustainable regional economic growth,” Massay says. “This can absolutely be replicated and tailored for wider expansion.”

Indeed, Moyo Gems recently began working in Sierra Leone, with a focus on ASM diamonds. So far, the program has conducted scoping and feasibility assessments and delivered GIA-led training adapted specifically to diamonds to 300 miners in Kono District, with plans to expand.

“This is the first training in our area, and it has helped us to look at diamonds differently. It has given us key knowledge on how to negotiate at a selling table,” says Kumba Ajibu, a small-scale mine site owner in Kono.

Participants received scales, hand loupes, scoops, and tweezers. This is vital valuation equipment, yet for most of the women who took part, it was their first time handling such tools.

“Before, we only saw men touching this equipment, and we would give diamonds to them to sell for us whenever we found one,” says a miner named Mitra. “This will help me to look at costing differently than before.”

To learn more about Moyo Gems or to support our work, reach Norbert Massay at @email.