Jewellers welcome diamond deal

THE Jewellers’ Association of Namibia (Jassona) has welcomed the new sales agreement between the Namibian Government and diamond giant De Beers, which was sealed this week.

“This agreement will enable Namibian diamond-cutting and polishing factories to now cut locally mined diamonds and make them available to Namibian manufacturing jewellers,” Jassona said. “During the last few years there has been a growing demand from tourists as well as Namibian clients to purchase diamonds mined and cut in Namibia and distributed by the proposed Namibia Diamond trading Company (NDTC),” Jassona chairperson Andreas Herrlé said in a short statement on Wednesday.The new diamond deal provides for 16 per cent of the annual diamond production of De Beers subsidiary Namdeb to be sold directly to Namibian diamond-cutting and polishing plants.This translates into approximately 320 000 carats.Namdeb and sister company De Beers Marine mined about 2 million carats last year.The sales agreement will make it possible for Namibian diamond cutters and manufacturing jewellers to start branding diamonds and jewellery made with them as truly Namibian.Up to now, Namibian cutters and polishers had to buy De Beers and Namdeb diamonds from overseas via the London-based Diamond Trading Company(DTC), the selling arm of De Beers.They could not choose freely which diamonds to buy, but rather bought a mixture of varying quality diamonds from different mines worldwide belonging to De Beers.Only about a hundred hand-picked buyers or “sight holders’ can buy such parcels.The Namibian Government demanded from De Beers that at least a percentage of diamonds mined in Namibia should be available locally.This had not been possible since De Beers took over diamond production about 70 years ago from colonial Germany’s erstwhile diamond fields.The first Namibian diamond was found in 1908 near Luederitz.”During the last few years there has been a growing demand from tourists as well as Namibian clients to purchase diamonds mined and cut in Namibia and distributed by the proposed Namibia Diamond trading Company (NDTC),” Jassona chairperson Andreas Herrlé said in a short statement on Wednesday.The new diamond deal provides for 16 per cent of the annual diamond production of De Beers subsidiary Namdeb to be sold directly to Namibian diamond-cutting and polishing plants.This translates into approximately 320 000 carats.Namdeb and sister company De Beers Marine mined about 2 million carats last year.The sales agreement will make it possible for Namibian diamond cutters and manufacturing jewellers to start branding diamonds and jewellery made with them as truly Namibian.Up to now, Namibian cutters and polishers had to buy De Beers and Namdeb diamonds from overseas via the London-based Diamond Trading Company(DTC), the selling arm of De Beers.They could not choose freely which diamonds to buy, but rather bought a mixture of varying quality diamonds from different mines worldwide belonging to De Beers.Only about a hundred hand-picked buyers or “sight holders’ can buy such parcels.The Namibian Government demanded from De Beers that at least a percentage of diamonds mined in Namibia should be available locally.This had not been possible since De Beers took over diamond production about 70 years ago from colonial Germany’s erstwhile diamond fields.The first Namibian diamond was found in 1908 near Luederitz.