LABMATE Online
It’s certainly an intriguing question — not just for scientific minds, but for investors and economists too. Gold has been an integral part of our society for thousands of years. It’s been used in trade, and has long been a sign of opulence and wealth. But can we measure all the gold in the world? That means every gold watch, every nugget, every ancient coin. Is it even possible? The answer is an ambiguous ‘yes’ and ‘no’.
There have been a number of estimates, all based on historical fact and figures. But they each vary wildly. So which figures can we trust, if any at all? First, what do we mean when we say ‘all the gold in the world’? We’re not talking about the gold that is still in the ground. We are referring to the gold that has already been mined — whether it’s taken shape as a piece of jewellery or traded on the black market.
There are, of course, some systems in place to track the amount of gold that is mined. But this is a relatively recent development, especially considering some historians say we have been mining gold for as much as 6,000 years.