Thank you, Madam Chair. Under the arrangements with previous manufacturers who are authorized to manufacture and use the government-certified diamond brand or the polar bear brand, those operators were then permitted to sell that product to authorized retailers in North America and elsewhere. Those retailers, of course, would have accumulated inventory and had the right to sell that inventory over whatever period of time necessary.
As committee is aware, the operators that we previously had a licence to do this no longer exist and the products that they would have sold to retailers would still be in inventory, potentially, in North America. Those are still allowed to be sold as government-certified or polar bear brand diamonds.
We continue to monitor closely the advertising practices across the country. We’ve had many experiences of what we consider inappropriate advertising of brand that we followed up on, and we rely on the services of both brand specialists and, of course, department staff to monitor this and track down any other complaints that are brought to our attention.
Overall, the permission to sell existing inventory exists by retailers that may still have inventory, but no further manufacturing sales under those previous arrangements are authorized. Of course, we’re working with our two currently approved northern-authorized manufacturers to deal with that for the going forward approach. Thank you, Madam Chair.