Backes & Strauss : Victoria Blue Heart give them a voice !!
by Luxury.Net
Backes & Strauss are delighted and proud to reveal the bespoke designed Victoria Blue heart, created an crafted in white gold with white diamonds and blue sapphires to directly benefit and highlight the work of the United Nations Blue Heart Campaign against Human Trafficking, which we wholeheartedly support.
The Victoria Collection is inspired by Backes & Strauss 19th century jewellery designs from the company’s achivecollection, the Victoria Era, given a fresh and novel twist by the design team and brought to life by supreme
craftmen.
Backes & Strauss Victoria Blue Heart give them a voice
Size: 18mm dial Ø, 35mm Ø incl interlocking Hearts
Case: 18 carat white gold case. 191 diamonds, 1.68 carats and 25 blue sapphires (0.275 carat).
Dial: Mother of Pearl centre dial hand set with 4 white diamond indexes weighing (0.02 carat)
Hands: Blued-steel sword-shaped hands
Movement: Quartz movement
Display: Hours & minutes
Bracelet: White satin strap
Buckle: 24 white diamonds (0.21 carat) hand set into a 18 carat white gold heart buckle
Water-resistant to 30 meters
Total carats:
215 white diamonds, 1.91 carats
25 blue sapphires, 0.275 carat
Human trafficking is a crime that shames us all. It involves the act of recruiting, transporting, transferring, harbouring or receiving a person through use of force, coercion, deception or other means, for the purpose of exploiting them. Every year, thousands of men, women and children fall into the hands of traffickers, in their own countries and abroad. Every country in the world is affected by trafficking, whether as a country of origin, transit or destination for victims. Backes & Strauss and the UNODC, as guardian of the United Nations Conventions against Transnational Organized Crime (UNTOC) and its Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons has human trafficking as one of their priority areas of work.
• It is estimated that 2.4 million people throughout the world are lured into forced labour as a
result of human trafficking at any given time. (ILO, 2005)
• Women and girls account for about 80% of the detected victims. Child trafficking accounts for about 15-20% of the
victims. Child trafficking has been detected in all regions of the world, and in some countries is the major form of
trafficking detected. (UNODC, 2009)
• Sexual exploitation accounts for about 80% of the detected cases. Experts believe trafficking in persons for forced
• labour is greatly under-detected or that it is mostly prosecuted under other offences. (UNODC, 2009)
In 30% of the countries where the gender of the offender was known, more women were
convicted for human trafficking related offences than men. (UNODC, 2009)
• The United Nations estimates the total market value of illicit human trafficking at US$32
billion. (ILO, 2005)
• The data on detected cases show that intra-regional trafficking in persons (within a region)
was predominant in most countries and that trans-regional (across regions), though still
significant, was relatively less frequent. (UNODC, 2008)
• Domestic trafficking was detected in at least 32 countries among those where information was
available, and in some countries, it is a major issue. (UNODC, 2008)
The Blue Heart Campaign
The Victoria Blue Heart watch and the Blue Heart Campaign’s goals are to inspire people and mobilize support for
action against human trafficking by international organizations, governments, civil society, the private sector and
ultimately by individuals. The Blue Heart also aims to enable citizens to show their support to the cause and to
increase understanding of, and create urgency around the issue of human trafficking in order to spur coordinated
actions to fight the crime. The intention is that the Blue Heart becomes the symbol for human trafficking. Backes &
Strauss is proud to share it
