The October Antwerp Diamond Conference 2007 showed that the course towards the development of the national diamond cutting industry in African diamond mining countries causes some skepticism among some industry professionals and populist arguments in favor of African cut have little to do with economic reality.

Pro's arguments boil down to a thesis that is extremely attractive in its simplicity: diamonds are mined here, and they should be cut off, as local cuts will supplement the budget with taxes and at least partially solve the problem of unemployment. As stated in 2005 by the President of Namibia: "This (the development of the cut - Ed.) Not only meets the efforts of the people of Namibia to increase the value of our natural resources, but will also create new jobs and increase the level of introduction of new technologies in our economy."

Contra arguments are not so obvious, but their careful consideration allows us to understand the true causes of this trend, which seriously worries the market.

Let us begin by stating the fact that the negative experience of creating a national lapidary industry in Africa has already taken place. After the fall of the apartheid regime (1994), the Diamond Council of South Africa issued more than 1,000 licenses for the opening of the lapidary enterprises to the black citizens of the country, the vast majority of these firms quickly went bankrupt, the rest were engaged exclusively in dealership.

During the next decade, the idea of African cut was discussed rather sluggishly, but in 2005 a genuine renaissance came. Almost simultaneously, senior government officials and political leaders from South Africa, Namibia and Botswana made very categorical proposals for the organization of large-scale lapidary industry in these states, and these initiatives were accompanied by harsh criticism of De Beers. So, in July 2005, the president of Namibia, in a meeting with the owner of De Beers, Nicky Oppenheimer, noted that "Namdeb, a subsidiary of De Beers in Namibia, is not going to do anything for the country where it produces diamonds. Namibians, said H. Pohamba, demand that diamonds mined in Namibia are processed there. "We consider diamonds to be our natural wealth, which belongs to all citizens of the country," he said.

This time, the standard populist rhetoric of black leaders was complemented by serious organizational proposals to move the world's center for sorting and trading of rough diamonds from London to Botswana, adopting radical legislation that provides serious preferences in accessing raw materials for local cutters such as the South African "Bill of Amendments" To the Diamonds Amendment Bill and the initiation of constructive negotiations with De Beers on the creation of joint structures through which African cutters will provide ivatsya raw materials. Unlike the events of ten years ago, the process looked much more serious and could hardly be explained by another sporadic outburst of national self-awareness.
 
Indeed, a number of events took place on the world diamond market in 2005,

By the summer of 2005, prices for rough diamonds had reached their maximum values since 2000 - from the moment De Beers declared a rejection of monopoly regulation of the market and started implementing the "Supplier of Choice" strategy. At this peak (in July, August and September 2005), De Beers sells three record sites with a volume of $ 750 million, $ 850 million and $ 750 million, respectively, after which prices begin to fall rapidly - by the end of September, the fall was already 10% and Analysts predicted a long-term decline.
 
The bank was brilliantly broken, in addition, De Beers by 2005 finally got rid of an effective, but extremely expensive tool for monopoly regulation of the market - own sewage of rough diamonds. By that time, De Beers' reserves had fallen to about the average annual cost of three sites, While in 1998 they were equivalent to the cost of 14 sites. Thus, the reduction of the De Beers sinks took place consistently for five years under conditions of a continuous rise in prices, and was stopped shortly before the moment when prices began to fall.

Own production of De Beers, production of ALROSA and production of the other two largest producers of raw diamonds have been increasing all this time.

In 2005, the tension between De Beers and the European Commission continued to increase: the joint De Beers and ALROSA June proposal to smoothly reduce supplies by 2008, and most importantly, to maintain the annual volume of supplies of $ 275 million since 2009, did not find understanding in the European Commission . In February 2006, the European Commission issued a decision obliging De Beers to completely stop buying diamonds from ALROSA either directly or through intermediaries.

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