Debeers - Diamond Industry

The company took control of some of the key mines in Africa and forged ties with other large diamond producers around the world.

mines to be the sole buyer of their production at guaranteed high prices so as to safeguard the control of world supply.

We see clearly in the movie how the factors of production is used: land, labour, and entrepreneurship. Land is the resource where diamonds are found, and in Blood Diamond we see how the RUF uses a form of alluvial mining and open pit mining on the land. The men would find the diamonds by digging and shoveling in rocks that are eroded by rivers and streams. The result of this is disastrous to the land because of the enormous amount of soil that is removed to obtain the diamond. Also wasted rocks from the mining can leak harmful substances back into the water. Blood Diamond did an admirable job at depicting the realities of how

This essay supports the statement “The price of diamonds is too high”. Diamonds have always been presumed to be rare. They have been present in history as a symbol of wealth and luxury as they were so difficult to find. Nowadays diamonds are mined and are found all over the world but they are sold through a cartel. (Epstein 1982) A cartel limits the supply of a product in order to keep prices high and to limit competition. (South African Pocket Oxford Dictionary: 2002) This raises the question of whether diamonds are actually worth their price. This essay focuses on the origins and the basic theory behind the diamond cartel; the early operation of the cartel; De Beers’ strong market campaign; determining De Beers’ current

Diamonds have been known to man since ancient times and with new technology of the 21st century many diamonds rich areas have been identified and supply chain been established in line with those reserves.

As long as American in particular had the biggest and brightest diamonds the world seemed to continue to rotate. A few years ago; however, American found out the process of producing diamonds and were outraged at the unethical practices. Movements were launched and diamonds began to be referred to as “Blood Diamonds” if they came from unethical labor practices. Kayne West wrote a song entitled “Diamonds from Sierra Leone” and a movie was filmed under the name “Blood Diamond”, which both portrayed the unethical behavior taking place in Sierra Leone, Africa. At the public’s outcry diamond companies responded by checking their suppliers and publishing advertisements announcing that they have clean diamonds (see image 1). Nevertheless, the diamond producers continue to smuggle “blood diamonds” into other countries by mixing them into “clean diamonds” (see image 2). There is no feasible way to know the origins of millions of diamonds, which relates the moral and ethical reasons behind purchasing or not purchasing

While urging nations to open up trade and allow the free movement of capital, labor and goods, Nathan Rothschild was also monopolizing the diamond market with his colleague Cecil Rhodes. At one point he marveled at the fact that they had cornered 98% of the South African diamond production (37) This short vignette about Rothschild highlights a key point, which is that liberal and mercantilist ideas were used in tandem during this era. While superficially contradictory, these two policies are on in the same. They are the tools through which different actors fulfil their goal of making exorbitant

“The diamond industry provides significant revenues for market participants. In 1999, rough gem diamonds purchased at mine gate were valued by the Mining Journal at $7.3 billion. Diamonds sorted and polished were sold to jewelers for $14 billion. The value added by jewelers in the form of labor, gold, platinum and stones other than diamonds was estimated at $14 billion, bringing total production costs to some $28 billion. With a 100 percent retail margin, the value paid by consumers for diamond jewelry was estimated at $56 billion, of which almost half was sold in the United States. Most of the profit was made at the final stage in marketing the jewelry. An

This essay will argue for the statement that the price of diamonds is too high. It will analyse the diamond market as well as De Beers control over the diamond market and explain how the diamond cartel managed to gain

Rhodes saw the diamond cartel as a solution to this problem. Rhodes used the cartel to limit the supply of diamonds to the actual demand, thereby stockpiling the excess supply. De Beers not only controlled the market in South Africa, but they also expanded their holdings to other parts of the world, such as, England and Israel. (Epstein, 1982:1) By 1929, when Sir Oppenheimer took control of De Beers, the transition between the actual mining to the distribution, which is controlled by the Central Selling Organizing (CSO), became centrally controlled. (Spar, 2006:197-198)

A geographer investigates the economic impact Botswana has faced because of their diamond industry. In this paper I will be discussing how Botswana has economically developed as well as the struggles the country has faced due to the diamond industry. We will also dive into how Botswana’s geographic location affects the diamond industry.

A more significant threat for the company has been the rise of the synthetic diamond market where essentially real diamonds are manufactured within plants and don’t have to undergo millions of years of formation underground in addition to grueling extraction processes. These diamonds possess a lot of quality while being sold at a fraction of the prices of natural diamonds and have seen a rise in demand and in the total diamond market share. While DeBeers has played down the

Situation: DeBeers Consolidated Mines Limited (DBCM) occupies a major presence in the diamond industry. Discoveries of diamonds in the late 1800s were pioneered in South Africa, in which DeBeers held a heavy monopoly over. Since then, they have cultivated an impressive track record and leadership position. The Central Selling Organization (CSO) controls and regulates the flow and sale of rough diamonds, and was acquired by DeBeers in the 1930s. Due to a stable economy both locally and internationally, DBCM was the world’s largest producer and distributor of diamonds in late 1998. However, just before the turn of the century, globalization and developments in international

There are also some concerns that have been brought to our attention from different divisions of Diamond Chemicals. They include:

In the U.S the significance of a diamond is love or desire. It is a fetish commodity that consumers seek, in order to feel a certain way like love within them and their loved one. It is used in cultural significance. For instance, in Quinceneras. It also represents the class level one is in, like in the Kanye West’s music video. Two worlds are presented Prague and Africa. In Prague we see the jewelry stores representing it as a luxurious city and in Africa we see the mines and poor workers representing their low status. The main picture of the Kanye West video are the diamonds because of the illegal trading of blood diamonds. Blood diamonds are diamonds of war zone and Illicit diamonds are transnational trade networks deemed legitimate by non-state subjects. The production of these so called Blood diamonds was a revenue for many illegal diamond sellers in Sierra Leone and was what controlled many people to work for them through terrorism. A specific group that owned 90 percent of it was RUF. Although, diamonds have a symbolic meaning in our cultures associated with love ,consumers in the U.S should refrain from purchasing illegal diamonds because of the atrocities associated with the diamond trade, the way media limits themselves on how they portray the diamond’s meaning, and the contribution consumers have on this illegal diamond trade.