WASHINGTON – Included in the financial sector reform law President Obama signed this week was legislation designed to prevent trade in so-called conflict minerals from the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

A wide range of electronics will now be subject to new sourcing and supply chain requirements for at least five years. 

The law essentially bans the import of gold, columbite-tantalite, cassiterite and wolframite, and their derivatives, from the DRC by US-based publicly held companies, enacts strict reporting standards, and implements a new labeling procedure.

Under the new law, any publicly traded company that makes products that use conflict minerals and buys those minerals either in the DRC or an adjoining country must exercise due diligence on the source and supply chain.

Affected companies must provide annual reports on their measures taken to the Securities and Exchange Commission and on their websites. Steps include third-party audits of the report; any products manufactured by that company that contain conflict metals that directly or indirectly finance or benefit armed groups in the DRC or an adjoining country; the facilities used to process the conflict metals; the country of origin, and efforts taken to determine the mine or location of origin of the conflict metals with the greatest possible specificity.

Under the new law, products may be labeled “DRC conflict free.”

The current list of metals is not set in stone; the US State Department may add to the list in the future.