Diamond exports from Zimbabwe are expected to regain their sparkle in 2018, according to reports from the state-owned Zimbabwe Consolidated Diamond Company and mines minister Winston Chitando. This after the country failed to hold a diamond sale in 2017, despite a target of two million carats a year. The sale of diamonds will help alleviate Zimbabwe’s foreign exchange shortage, which will in turn keep goods moving into the country. Zimbabwe earned US$106.267 million from diamond sales in 2016, according to official figures, making the gemstones the fifth-biggest foreign exchange earner, after tobacco, gold, nickel and ferrochromium. The Zimbabwe Consolidated Diamond Company (ZCDC) was formed in March 2016 after the ruling party took over all diamond mining firms in the eastern Marange fields because, according to the government, the mining licences had expired. Diamond production plunged to 1.3 million in 2016 and 1.8 million in 2017, from a peak of 12 million carats after the nationalisation of the operations. Production, according to the ZCDC website, was affected in 2017 by delays in the commissioning of a new US$15-million 450-ton-per-hour conglomerate processing plant. The delays were caused by a combination of forex constraints and customs, according to the ZCDC. These challenges have been overcome, according to the company. In January 2018 Chitando told the Zimbabwean parliament that the first diamond sales in over a year would be in February. ZCDC says it has built a stockpile of about 1.5 million carats, and has improved the quality of the diamonds to gem or near gem quality from predominantly industrial quality by 34% after introducing a Diamond Value Management (DVM) process which follows a diamond’s passage “from the mine to the finger”. The company has also invested in new deep-cleaning equipment which raises the value of the rough diamonds. Production for 2018 is forecast to be around 3.5 million carats.
