On September 7, 2026, in Vicenza, Italy, the board of the World Jewellery Confederation, known as CIBJO, approved a recommendation that “synthetic” become the sole descriptor for created diamonds and colored stones in international communication. The vote reversed CIBJO’s earlier position, which accepted “laboratory-grown” and “laboratory-created” as valid terms. Buried in the same announcement is the detail that matters most: The board acknowledged that “laboratory-grown” and “laboratory-created” are accepted in certain jurisdictions, and that national law takes precedence wherever it applies. In other words, CIBJO has no authority to enforce the word it just voted for. Its members, by its own description, are not consumers but trade associations and commercial bodies. What it issued is a recommendation, from the trade to the trade.
I have an obvious stake in this matter as my family has been in the diamond business since 1933 and I work with created diamonds today. I won’t argue which word is correct. The only test that matters, whether a term builds consumer confidence or erodes it, has already been run by bodies with no stake in the answer. Using that test, I believe this vote fails the consumers it claims to protect. And there’s a broader lesson here, beyond my industry.
How This Differs From International Standards
CIBJO’s stated goal is consumer protection, yet its ruling stands in contrast to others made by the Federal Trade Commission in the United States and governing bodies in India, one of the largest diamond markets. The FTC spent years reviewing its jewelry guides before revising them in 2018. It removed “synthetic” from its own recommended terms because of the likelihood of consumer confusion. India’s Bureau of Indian Standards reached the same conclusion, favoring “laboratory-grown diamond” instead. The Gemological Institute of America, which grades both categories, rebuilt its created-diamond grading system in 2025 and kept “laboratory-grown” throughout. De Beers, one of the largest diamond brands in the world, agrees. Antoine Borde, the CEO of De Beers’ parent company, told Rapaport that outside of France, he would keep using “lab-grown diamond” because “this is now commonly used by consumers.”
By CIBJO’s own count, more than half of U.S. engagement rings sold by volume now feature created diamonds. That is not a market confused about what it is buying. That is a market that received clarity and acted on it.
A Small Part Of A Big Map
According to Rapaport, France adopted “synthetic” in 2024, Russia followed in 2026, and the African Diamond Producers Association, London Diamond Bourse and World Federation of Diamond Bourses have backed the same direction. That coalition is concentrated where mining and trading interests are strongest, and it covers a fraction of where diamonds are actually bought. The United States, by most estimates the world’s largest diamond jewelry market, and India, its largest cutting and polishing center, both examined this question and landed the other way. “Synthetic” is not winning the argument globally. It is winning where the people making the argument have the most to lose.
Who Was In The Room
To be fair to CIBJO, the created-diamond side made its case and lost. Wesley Hunt, chair of CIBJO’s own Laboratory-Grown Diamond Committee, told the Congress that a formal request to defer the vote had been submitted and that his committee had asked for “laboratory-grown” to remain an option. He was overruled by an assembly I believe was weighted toward bourses and producer associations built on mined diamonds.
There is real money behind that weight. Anglo American is trying to sell its 85% stake in De Beers for roughly $1 billion, down from $17.6 billion in 2001. The effort does not stop at recommendations. The American Gem Trade Association is also urging the FTC to “correct” its 2018 finding and is briefing members of the U.S. Congress to that end. A body that admits it cannot set the rule is now lobbying the regulator that can.
Naming Standards In Other Industries
American dairy groups have spent over $100 million since 2008 pressing regulators to strip “milk” from oat and almond products. The FDA let the word stand. Similarly, meat industry-backed laws restricting “burger” and “sausage” on plant-based labels have been struck down as unconstitutional in several states, including Arkansas and Texas. Also in Texas, a survey found consumers identified plant-based products correctly 96% of the time, and accuracy did not improve when the mandated disclaimers were added.
It does not always end this way. When Congress replaced “GMO” with the unfamiliar “bioengineered,” consumer advocates argued the term was less transparent, but they lost. I include that example because it cuts against my own industry’s story: Concentrated lobbying can prevail when it reaches legislation before it reaches evidence. That is exactly why I believe the burden of proof belongs on whoever wants to change what consumers already call the thing they are buying.
The Standard I Would Argue For
Diamonds, natural and created, sell on one shared thing: the buyer’s trust that the product is what it is called. A jeweler in Mumbai, a lab in New York and a wholesaler in Antwerp now answer to different standards from different authorities that do not agree with each other. That erodes confidence in the entire category, exactly when the trade, mine included, needs it most.
I do not think trade bodies are illegitimate. I have sat in these rooms for 30 years. But there is a difference between an assembly that votes and a regulator that tests a claim against the people it is meant to protect. If “synthetic” truly serves consumers better, it should survive that test the way “laboratory-grown” already has in two of the world’s largest diamond markets. Until it does, the responsible course is to leave buyers the word they have already chosen. A vote in Vicenza does not outrank a customer at the counter.
