Toby Hewitt joined coloured gemstones miner Gemfields in December 2014. Gemfields’ key geography is Africa with a number of world class assets at varying stages of development in Zambia, Mozambique and Ethiopia. Gemfields’ ambition is to do for coloured gemstones in the twenty-first century what De Beers did for diamonds in the twentieth century.

As such, the key focus is to produce reliable and responsibly-sourced rubies, emeralds and sapphires whilst setting new industry standards for compliance with international environment, social and safety standards. Against a backdrop of an industry sector with an at times chequered history of transparency, of operating in developing countries and of the perennial need to finance new developments (whilst containing costs), Hewitt says that the nature of his work at Gemfields is always interesting, highly varied and sometimes challenging. Hewitt comments that his role is about problem solving as much as providing legal advice.

His career prior to Gemfields provided an excellent expertise and experience base upon which to draw for his current role. Indeed he mentions that, alongside his experience in Africa, he has ‘had exposure to a variety of other jurisdictions including in the Asia Pacific region’, in particular with the Indonesian oil and gas business of Australian company, Santos, and with unconventional gas producer, Dart Energy.

‘Whilst at Santos, I was involved in managing the company’s response to a very serious gas well control incident onshore East Java, Indonesia and mitigating the potential liability flowing from that. With Dart, I was tasked with preparing the company’s international holding subsidiary for IPOs on respectively SGX and London AIM’. As he explains: ‘I have learnt to be calm in a crisis and to take things one step at a time. The sheer variety of matters which I have encountered whilst working in the energy and resources sector has improved my versatility and resilience’.

Gemfields is now wholly-owned by Johannesburg-listed, Pallinghurst Resources, which also operates manganese and platinum group minerals mining projects in South Africa. Hewitt is looking forward to joining Pallinghurst as group general counsel in the coming weeks.