Page 23 - Bullion World Volume 03 Issue 6 June 2023

Bullion World | Volume 3 | Issue 6 | June 2023

HUID- Unique global initiative

ensuring traceability and quality

Mr James Jose, President, Hallmarking Federation of India

Mandated hallmarking of gold jewellery, which has been a great success.
Mr James Jose an industry veteran who has been long associated with
and an expert in this initiative, shares the achievements of the programme
and guides us through mandatory hallmarking of bullion and the way
forward

The proposed mandatory jewellery article and can be verified
hallmarking of gold bullion shall by the customer in the BIS Care App
take forward the rich legacy and downloaded to a mobile phone.
experience of the 23 years of Compared to jewellery hallmarking,
jewellery hallmarking in India, bullion hallmarking shall be much
starting from April 11, 2000. easier; the number of articles
Hallmarking volumes have gone shall be much lower, but bullion
up from the earlier 1 lakh jewellery being an asset class product, the Mr James Jose
articles per day in the voluntary task ahead is to ensure that all used for B2B sales as raw material
hallmarking regime, to 10 lakh the hallmarked bullion bars shall for jewellery manufacturing across
/ 1 million jewellery articles per be confirmed to good delivery India. The jewellery trade and the
day in the mandatory hallmarking parameters. The majority of the various artisan’s associations have
regime, that too with a unique bullion in India and its raw material, been demanding the mandatory
HUID traceability code for each gold dore, is imported through hallmarking of bullion at the various
hallmarked article, generated from official channels, through limited stakeholders’ meetings in New Delhi.
the BIS HUID portal. In terms of gateways, and hence the data on The proposal for the first phase
quantity, this may be more than bullion is reliable, with downstream of mandatory bullion hallmarking
1000 tonnes of jewellery articles dealers being GST registered, and shall commence with the bullion
annually, sold through 1,50,000 hence mandatory hallmarking of bars manufactured by the 44 BIS-
retail jewellers nationwide. The HUID bullion can easily be tracked and recognized gold refineries in the
hallmark, which is unique globally, enforced. Less than 10,000 GST country, and the 2nd phase may
shall reveal the provenance of the regd dealers trade bullion, mostly cover the remaining portion of the
bullion originating from various other
Size of Indian bullion industry – Bullion supply and demand, average sources and trade across India.
quantity per year
No Item of bullion Official supplies Demand / Consumption Percentage share of emand
1 Bullion imported from LBMA sources 400 tonnes
2 Bullion domestically refined from gold 300 tonnes
dore imported by BIS-licensed refineries
3 Bullion from Domestic recycling 200 tonnes
4 Bullion from Unorganized retailers and grey
market (estimated 300 tonnes)
A Total official supplies of bullion 900 tonnes
1 Central bank purchase 126 tonnes 20%
2 Investment bars and coins 126 tonnes 20%
3 Industrial purposes 30 tonnes 5%
4 For Jewellery fabrication 900 tonnes 55%
B Total consumption of bullion per year 1200 tonnes 100%

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