India now fourth largest gold recycling country: World Gold Council

New Delhi, Jun 21: The World Gold Council (WGC) on Tuesday said that India is the fourth largest country in global gold recycling.

In the report, the WGC said that 11 per cent of India's gold supply in the last five years has been from "old gold"

Recycling in India is a Rs 440 billion industry making up 11% of the average local annual supply in the last five years, WGC noted. There are three sources of gold recycling: jewellery, manufacturing scrap, and end-of-life industrial scrap. Old jewellery scrap represents the largest source of recycling in India, with an approximate 85% share of the total, the report said.

The other key component is old bars and coins that people either sell or exchange for jewellery; which are estimated to make up about 10% to 12% of scrap gold supply. Lastly, industrial scrap, generated from end-of-life electronic products, accounts for less than 5% of total Indian scrap supply, ANI reported.

"The industrial scrap market in India is largely unorganised and only a small proportion finds its way to refineries. This may be largely due to the fact that only a handful of Indian gold refineries have the capability to refine industrial scrap," the report said.