3. International initiatives to control conflict minerals

3.1 Initiatives by companies in the electronics industry

In parallel with the various laws governing conflict minerals, numerous industry initiatives and programs have emerged in recent years, sometimes superimposed on one another and complicating the framework for action.

In 2008, the German Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources (BGR), the German cooperation agency GIZ and the governments of Rwanda and the DRC developed the Certified Trading Chains (CTC) initiative – certified supply chains –, a voluntary certification system to promote traceability, transparency and ethical production standards