Birmingham’s jewellery quarter sparkles with tradition
Interesting facts about diamonds and diamond jewelry.
Venetia diamond mine in South Africa is the largest diamond mine in the country, and also one of the largest diamond mines in the world. It is owned by the world's largest diamond company De Beers with the production of more than 3 million carats per year.
The first few months of 2013 weren't were good in terms of production for Venetia diamond mine because of unusually heavy rainfall and mine flooding. The extension of this year's rainfall hasn't been seen for decades and has led to flooding of the mine with 23 meters of water.
This has led to major decrease in production but the production should return back to normal in the second half of the year. At the start of this year De Beers invested $2.27 billion in the Venetia mine that should be enough to guarantee production for the next three decades.
Venetia diamond mine represents around three quarters of total South-African diamond production for De Beers so this massive investment doesn't come as a big surprise.
De Beers have recently also announced the launching of the largest sea-going vehicle in the world for mining diamonds that should soon become responsible for a full 30% of the firm's annual diamond production, or in numbers should be able to recover approximately 350,000 carats of precious gems.
Rough diamonds. In the last few years there has been a reduction in rough diamond production. |
Canada is quickly becoming one of the top diamond producers. Many Canadian diamond mines are increasing their production and given the gigantic size of Canada's territory it is realistically to expect that Canada will remain one of the top world diamond producers for foreseeable future.
Canadian diamonds are also known as polar diamonds, and they are among the best quality diamonds on the global diamond market, especially in terms of hardness and purity.
Quality and hardness are not the only reasons why buyers choose Canadian diamonds. One thing that is equally, if not more important, is that these diamonds aren't conflict or blood diamonds like some diamonds from Africa are.
These diamonds are not financed by guerrilla groups in countries at civil war like this was for instance case with diamonds from Sierra Leone. There is no forced child labor, rape, torture, and other horrible things associated with blood diamonds.
There are very strict regulations enforced all over Canada in relation to diamond mining and mining in general, with very strict labor and environmental laws. In fact, many Canadian diamond mines are ISO certified, meaning that they follow the best possible environmental practices.
Buying Canadian diamonds with polar bear image trademark therefore gives you not only top quality but also ethical security, which cannot be provided with some of the diamonds coming from Africa.