Lynda Lawson

Lynda is currently under taking a Ph.D. entitled Pathways, opportunities and challenges for women working across the gemstone value chain in Madagascar.

Lynda is also the knowledge transfer and training manager at the University of Queensland’s Centre for Social Responsibility in Mining. She has designed and led training and train the trainer programs in the extractive industry in Africa, Asia, Australia and South America. She is especially interested in miner education and in practical field gemmology courses for women miners. She is currently designing a specialised online course Understanding Coloured Gemstones. Her special area of expertise is in women in gemstone mining in Madagascar and she is currently researching women’s work across the sapphire value chain: miners, traders, cutters and jewellers.

She is a senior researcher on the Tiffany and Co Foundation Coloured Gemstone Knowledge Hub GemHub.