FEATURE-Slump shows Botswana rough side of diamond trade
* Pass out in diamond demand prompts cuts in education
* Mine shutdowns a foretaste of latent future hardship
* Global nature of crisis may protect ruling party at polls
By Ed Cropley
LETLHAKHANE, Botswana, Sept 15 (Reuters) - It is a eat one's heart out way from Wall Street to Granny's Lodge in central Botswana, but the depreciation triggered by the fall of Lehman Brothers a year ago has nonetheless turned Beneficent Oageng's career dreams to dust.
"I'm here because of the recession," said the 19-year-old the missis sitting behind the guest house's spartan reception desk, leafing listlessly through a reservations post whose blank spaces tell of all the people who aren't coming to postponement in this diamond town 400 km (250 miles) north of Gaborone.
Twelve months ago she had hoped to be sustained-gone, the beneficiary of a university place funded by the authority from the world's most valuable diamond business.
With annual sales well in over-abundance of $3 billion, diamonds had been helping turn Botswana -- the wilderness in sub-Saharan Africa best known for the series "The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Intermediation" -- into a model of commodity-powered development.
Its watchword "diamonds for development" was designed to counter that of "blood diamonds" mined to reservoir civil war in West Africa.
But the contraction in the global briefness has crushed demand for the gem stones that account for 40 percent of Botswana's compactness: in a country with one of Africa's highest rates of adult female literacy, tuition has taken a hit.
Australia's Diamond Production -82% in Fiscal 4Q
Australia’s diamond opus fell 81 percent to 583,000 carats in the region that ended June 30, 2009, the country’s Bureau of Statistics (ABARE) reported.Australia’s ballpark unfair diamond exports declined 36 percent to $65 million (AUD 76 million), with all its in volume sent out of the country. Rough diamond imports to Australia mow down 4.7 percent to $87 million (AUD 102 million) during the three months.
The volume of Australia’s diamond production comes from Rio Tinto’s Argyle mine, where the Pty slowed production during the quarter in response to the drop in need for diamonds. Rio Tinto reported in July that Argyle’s production demolish 86 percent to 408,000 carats during the quarter.
For the financial year that ended June 30, Australia’s fabrication fell 6.6 percent to 15.528 million carats, below ABARE's foregoing estimates of 18.022 million carats. Rough exports for the year rose 8 percent to $579.5 million (AUD 671 million) from 16.279 million carats.
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