This toolkit is part of a series that explores how development assistance can address key risk factors associated with conflict. One area that is receiving increasing attention is the relationship between natural resources and violence. In many recent conflicts, valuable or scarce resources - land, water, timber, or minerals have played a central role in both causing and sustaining violence. In particular, valuable minerals took center stage after ‘conflict diamonds’ or ‘blood diamonds’, became a prominent feature of Sierra Leone’s civil war. Unfortunately, competition over coltan in the Democratic Republic of the Congo has followed a similarly brutal course. This toolkit: 1) examines the relationship between valuable minerals, such as diamonds or coltan, and violence; 2) discusses lessons learned in developing programs to deal with ‘conflict commodities’; 3) presents a range of program options; 4) provides a survey instrument that identifies key questions related to minerals and conflict; and 5) identifies relevant USAID mechanisms and implementing partners. Monitoring and evaluation tools are being developed. Together, the elements of this toolkit are designed to help raise awareness about the linkages among valuable minerals, development assistance, and conflict; and to assist officers integrate a conflict perspective into their development programming.