In a major boost to gold and diamond mining in India, mining giant Rio Tinto, which has discovered an immensely rich diamond resource of 37 million tonnes in northern India’s Madhya Pradesh state, is set to invest $79 million in the country.

The second-largest mining company in the world, Rio Tinto, has decided to mine diamonds in India from its Bunder Diamond project at Chhatarpur district in Madhya Pradesh. With an investment target of around $79 million, the owner of the fancy red and pink coloured diamonds hopes the project will substantially add to its kitty.
Madhya Pradesh is a major diamond producing state with estimated prospects of 1,200 thousand carats of diamond reserve.

> continue reading "Rio Tinto to grow Indian diamond presence"

Harare — Zimbabwe’s diamond output from Marange fields could reach 40 million carats within the next three years, realising about US$2 billion per year, a Belgian diamond expert has said.

Mbada Diamonds and Canadile Miners are the only two mining firms extracting the gemstones in the Marange diamonds fields, occupying 10 percent of the total area.

“With the new diamond find in Chiadzwa (Marange), we are estimating 40 million carats per year and US$2 billion per year in revenue,” Mr Filip van Loere told media this week. Mr van Loere is advising the Government on ensuring compliance with the Kimberly Process Certification Scheme. The country was granted permission to sale its diamonds last month following the approval by the KP.

> continue reading "Zimbabwe: Diamond Output to Surge"

Only three months after it was announced that Debswana was going to proceed with the construction of a $55-million modular tailings treatment project (MTTP) at its Jwaneng mine, in Botswana, the project has now been delayed.

Aim-listed Firestone Diamonds on Thursday informed shareholders that Debswana, which is a joint venture (JV) between De Beers and the government of Botswana, had decided to delay the implementation of the MTTP to focus its resources on existing projects at the Orapa and Jwaneng diamond mines.

In June, Firestone announced that it had been selected by Debswana to finance, build and operate the MTTP.

The company noted that Debswana had assured it that the MTTP remained a strategically important project, which would be pursued when its other higher-priority projects were more advanced.

> continue reading "Debswana delays $55m tailings project – Firestone"

Sarin Technologies will offer free inscriptions on diamonds during the Hong Kong Jewellery & Gem Fair. The inscriptions will be carried out by Sarin’s recently launched DiaScribe SL system. People interested in a free diamond inscription can stop by Sarin’s booth on September 15 or 16 and get it done on the spot. The service is limited to one diamond per visitor.

The DiaScribe SL is a new high performance and reduced cost system, Sarin said in a statement.

Source: www.idexonline.com

The World Federation of Diamond Bourses is mourning the death of former WFDB President Yitzchak Forem, who passed away on September 1 after a long illness.

Forem was elected president of the Israel Diamond Exchange in 1993 and served three terms until 1998, when he was elected president of the WFDB.

Born in Poland in 1938, Forem survived the Holocaust and immigrated to Israel in 1949. He served as a career IDF officer for many years, retiring at the rank of lieutenant-colonel.

In 1961, Forem began working for Union Bank, which has strong links to businesses in the Israel diamond sector and diamond trade. For 16 years, he served in a number of managerial positions, and in 1978 left the bank to pursue a career in the diamond industry.

> continue reading "WFDB Mourns Former Israel Diamond Exchange President Yitzchak Forem"

Botswana is hoping to revive its resources sector through the introduction of new legislative measures, an official from the Minerals, Energy and Water Resources Ministry said on Wednesday. Permanent secretary Gabaake Gabaake said in Perth that the proposed changes to the legislation would be effected by the end of 2011. “The new minerals policy objectives will ensure that economic benefits for Botswana are maximised from the resources recovery, while enabling private investors to earn competitive returns,” he said.

“We take seriously the return to investors from projects and we have ensured such investors can repatriate profits so that a competitive environment to stimulate minerals exploration and exploitation ensues.

> continue reading "Botswana plans to speed up mining licence applications"

The eight winners of a prestigious platinum jewellery competition have now been confirmed, along with details of their pieces. An 11-strong panel of experts assessed drawings presented to them in April to determine who should land the honours for this year’s Lonmin Design Innovation Awards. The assessment was split into two categories, namely ‘Emerging Designers’, for those with less than five years’ commercial experience, and ‘Established Designers’, for those with more than five years’ involvement in the industry.

In the former group, the winners were James Powell of TCJ Designs, Miranda Wallis of Mirranna, Luke Rose of Luke Rose Jewellery and Dot the Jewellers’ John Bradley.

> continue reading "Prestigious platinum jewellery competition winners announced 1st September 2010"

Unhealthy competition at home

Nguyen Van Dung at My Linh Ngan Jewellery Company says many gold companies are prone to cheat on the purity of their products. They pass off goods with only 51 or 68 percent gold content as 18 carat.

> continue reading "Gold jewellery companies would welcome more State supervision"

The Rio Tinto diamond company plans to invest some $79 million in diamond exploration and production in India’s Madhya Pradesh region, with a focus on Chhatarpur’s Bunder mines, Steelguru.com reported.

According to Additional Chief Secretary of Madhya Pradesh Satya Prakash, a formal memorandum of understanding between Rio Tinto and the state government was expected to be drawn up and in effect by October 2010.

Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh Shivraj Singh Chauhan said that some of the region’s rich mineral resources now belonged to Chhattisgarh state, but noted that there were still investment opportunities for the diamond industry, as well as bauxite, aluminium, limestone, and coal mining.

> continue reading "Rio Tinto to Invest $79M in Diamond Exploration in Madhya Pradesh"

The volume of India’s rough diamond imports tapered off compared to last year, declining from 14.8 million carats imported in July 2009 to 13.4 million carats imported this past July. The total value of imports, however, increased 7.4 percent to $942.3 million, according to provisional data figures released by the Gem & Jewellery Export Promotion Council (GJEPC).

The shift in value and volume shows the changes in the price of rough diamonds over the past year. Rough imported into the diamond center increased from an average value of $59.47 per carat last year to $70.58 p/c this year, an 18.7 percent year to year increase.

India exported 2.3 million carats of rough diamonds worth $63.4 million, an average value of $27.43 p/c.

Source: www.idexonline.com