India's Growing Diamond Industry
PostBy Avi Paz Group At 31.10.2010
India, the cradle of the world's diamond industry, is experiencing a diamond renaissance on a number of levels – as a producer, with major diamond companies like Rio Tinto investing heavily in new diamond projects in the country's Madhya Pradesh region; as a trader (in October 2010 Mumbai inaugurated the largest diamond bourse in the world); and as a consumer.
With an emerging middle class that is increasingly exposed to Western media and traditions, including that of a man presenting a woman with a diamond ring when proposing, diamond jewelry is one of the country's fastest-growing trade sectors. Record amounts of diamond and gemstone jewelry are being manufactured in India for both local consumption and export.
According to the Economic Times, the country is seeing a 50% spike in demand for high-end diamond jewelry – defined as jewelry with a value of at least $11,000. Major Indian retail jewelers are reporting increases of anywhere from 15% to 50% in demand for high-end diamond jewelry – 60% of which, according to one official, is sold ahead of weddings, with a diamond set having become the new "norm" among India's upper-middle-class families.
Nor is India's diamond jewelry consumption limited to local products. De Beers is planning to work with retail jewelers in India to bring its new Forevermark brand to the subcontinent, launching the line in Bangalore and then expanding to other large cities including Mumbai and Delhi.
India's loose diamond exports are also on the rise. Cut and polished diamonds comprised $12.7 billion of India's total $18.9 billion worth of gem and jewelry exports in the first half of 2010 – an increase of 61.5% over the corresponding period the previous year. September 2010 alone saw $2.4 billion worth of diamonds exported from India – a year-on-year increase of 36.4%.
At the Mines to Market international diamond trade conference that took place in Mumbai in 2010, former De Beers CEO Gareth Penny said that in 2009, India had exported 7% of the world's diamonds, but predicted that by 2016, India's share of the diamond export market would increase to 10%.
