Diamond production of natural and synthetic diamond in the world.
Diamond is a mineral; this stone is a symbol of purity, romance and luxury. Diamond is used by jewellers to adorn rings and necklaces; it is not a gem engagement ring or princess necklace.
Diamond is also appreciated for its physical qualities in the industry for its hardness (harder than ruby or a sapphire, nothing except scratch another diamond), for its high thermal conductivity (higher than silver and copper, used in electronics) and its optical qualities. Its hardness makes it the largest number of industrial applications such as drill bits for oil drilling and exploration drilling for mine.
II. Diamonds: Production and Using.
Unit of diamond’s measurement is carat. One carat diamond is equal to 0.2 gram. One carat is divided into 100 points, one diamond of a half-carat equals50 points.
Production of rough diamonds is often measured in carats, it is also money (dollars). Unlike gold, one carat of rough diamond may have a different value according to several criteria: weight carat (price of the diamond does not progress linearly, but exponentially), according to colour measured on a scale of D to Z (exceptional white coloured) and according to its purity (no defects in the diamond).
In 2007, Russia was the largest producer of diamonds by number of carats of diamonds produced and the second in terms of value (38.7 million carats of diamonds and 2.6 billion dollars). Botswana is the largest producer by value (2.9 billion dollars) and the second in number of carats of diamonds produced (33.6 billion dollars).
Canada upset the hierarchy of producers by talking third place in terms of value (1.6 billion dollars) and fifth carat diamond product.
South Africa is the fourth largest diamond producer by value and the sixth in number of carats, then comes Angola, Namibia, Congo, Australia and finally China.
The following chart gives an estimate of possible numbers for 2009, these are obviously not yet available. We can already see on graph that diamond production began to decline in 2005, three years before the economic crisis of 2008.
The economic crisis has only amplified the already slightly downward trend in diamond production since 2005. In presence of an economic recovery, a slow return to 2007 levels is possible, but a return to 2005 levels seems much more difficult given the aging of the diamond mines and the small number of new diamond mines.
USA is the leading consumer of diamonds with half of global consumption. The following consumer countries are Japan and China, the country obviously amount to the consumption of diamonds is China. Despite the crisis, the 1st half of 2009 was a record for the half diamond imports in China. The consumption of gold and platinum jewellery looks favorable for 2010, thus the Chinese consumption of diamonds should also follow this trend.
The diamond cutting is done by lapidaries, it occurs mainly in Antwerp in Belgium, Israel and India. Just under half of the diamonds are of sufficient quality to be cut and used as gemstones and jewellery by jewellery-making. Other half of natural diamonds of lower quality (diamond too small, wrong colour or riddled with impurities) are used in industry where their hardness is much appreciated. Diamond is used on saws, drills, scalpels or some abrasive. Much of the synthetic production meets the demand of industrial diamonds. The production of synthetic diamonds is three times higher than natural diamonds, for years the natural diamond is not enough demand for industrial diamond.
There are two ways to consider the future of the diamond production in the world. The first, pessimistic thinking that the diamond is more eternal and production of natural diamond is threatened by the production of synthetic diamond. The second option is to believe that demand for natural diamond is like gold, and inexhaustible wonder how much remains to discover kimberlites that will ensure the sustainability of the world's diamond production.
As can be seen on the graph of diamond production, there is no difference between the production of natural and synthetic diamond. When demand for diamond exist both (synthetic and natural) moving in the same direction. If synthetic diamonds doesn’t exist, the price of natural diamond would be even higher because global production of natural diamond is insufficient to meet any demand.
In South Africa, diamond production began there more than 130 years. In many African country diamonds’s producer, production is almost centenary (Namibia, Zimbabwe, Democratic Republic of Congo, Angola, Ghana, Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Tanzania). Brazil's diamond production has commenced at the beginning of the 18th, Russia the intensive exploitation of diamonds began in the fifties. Since the early 90s, the new Eldorado of the diamond is Canada, Northern Canada, the most cold and isolated. It is very expensive to build a diamond mine, the proposed new diamond mines are worthy of the pharaohs, some mines in effect beyond the one billion dollar investment. The largest diamond producer in the world, which is the diamond that Rockefeller is the world's oil dominates the production of diamonds for over 130 years. It was completed in 2007 to build two mega projects in Canada, while a century since its production takes place in Africa, land of diamonds.
He does not seem to doubt the sustainability of the global demand for natural diamond.
Dr Thomas Chaize