Diamond production and exports in Namibia
Namibia is among the largest global diamond production countries and exporters (Table 1).
Table 1
Diamond production and exports in Namibia, 2006-2020.
Prospects for the development of the diamond business in Namibia
The current stage of the diamond business development in Namibia is characterized by the following factors:
1. Namibia’s offshore rough diamonds are beyond competition as they are brought to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean in the safest form, and their extraction using mining vessels is not very expensive and the value of one carat is several times higher than that of the diamonds mined from the kimberlite rocks in Africa.
2. The government of Namibia has urge the local cutting companies to ramp up their polished diamond manufacture in order to cut and polish at least 90% of the rough diamonds produced in Namibia.
3. The analysis of the Namibia’s diamond production since 2006 shows that the country overcame the 2009 global crisis without much effort due to the high quality of the rough diamonds produced and the relatively small volume of easily processed sand.
4. The central bank predicts that the Namibia's diamond production will decline by 14.9% in real figures in 2020 due to the expected drop in demand, which is exacerbated by logistical interruptions for auction sales due to the travel restrictions and border closures all over the world.
Yury Danilov, Ph. D., independent expert and analyst
