Rio Tinto Supplies First Bunder Rough to Indian Diamantaires

Rio Tinto Diamonds has supplied rough diamonds from its Bunder project in India to local diamantaires as part of a program to better understand the potential for future commercial production at the mine, Rapaport reported.
“Indian diamantaires are best placed to unlock the potential of the Bunder diamonds and the cutting and polishing tests and jewelry manufacturing process will provide us with vital information for the ongoing evaluation of the Bunder project,” said Bruce Cox, the managing director of Rio Tinto Diamonds.
Rio Tinto will track the cutting and polishing, design and manufacture of the gems until they are presented in the first collection of Bunder diamond jewelry, which will be displayed at the Indian International Jewellery Show in Mumbai in August.
The diamonds were presented to the selected diamantaires at a private event in Bhopal in the presence of Shri Rajendra Shukla, the mines minister of Madhya Pradesh, and Shri Jitendra Singh Bundela, a member of Parliament.
Rio Tinto recently received a nod to go ahead with the Bunder project and is now working on a mine plan and the environmental approvals required to receive the lease. The proposed mine has an inferred resource containing 27.4 million carats of diamonds. The mine is being developed with an estimated investment of about $430 million (INR 22 billion) and more than $60 million (INR 3 billion) has been spent to date, Rio Tinto reported.
This past week, Rio Tinto announced that it is considering options for its diamond business, including the possible sale of the assets,  as the sector does not fit its strategy to focus on “large, long-life, expandable” assets.