The diamond industry stands at a crossroads. The Kimberley Process, a scheme designed to certify that diamonds are “conflict-free”, is under pressure to reform. Once regarded as a landmark agreement between industry, governments and NGOs, it has been attacked for widespread shortcomings. Can it restore confidence in the industry and can consumers be sure of what they are buying? For years, the diamond business was dominated by mining house De Beers, which controlled global prices by buying and selling rough, unpolished diamonds from its rivals. But the turn of the century brought profound change. Facing antitrust pressure in the US, De Beers abandoned its cartel system, paving the way for the rise of Russia’s Alrosa, now the biggest producer of diamonds by volume, as well as a host of smaller players. At the same time, producers have been forced to face up to the widespread trade in so-called “conflict” or “blood diamonds”. These, according to the founding statement of the Kimberley Process, are rough diamonds used to finance conflicts against governments, such as the civil war in Angola, which ran from the Seventies until 2002. A solution was needed and, in 2000, a group of industry participants, government officials and observers met in Kimberley, South Africa.
A new generation of smugglers are using social media and encrypted apps to undermine the 2003 United Nations-backed Kimberley Process, designed to prevent “blood diamonds”, which are mined in war zones and used to fund violence, from entering the mainstream market. Critics claimed that the Process’s definition of conflict diamonds is no longer adequate. Last December, Canadian NGO Impact left the Process, following founding member Global Witness, which quit in 2010. The process has been criticised for being too slow and bureaucratic, with some countries refusing to sign up until they had received a list of all their diamond exports.