This content was first published on IGR – Italian Gemological Review no. 7 in 2019. The information provided here is therefore current as of the original publication date.
The ongoing trade war resulted in a sharp drop of Chinese export to the US and this seems to affect the international business of synthetic diamonds. In fact, currently the American lab-grown diamond market is not directly supplied as much as before by Chinese rough growers and cut stone manufacturers. Lab grown diamonds producers in mainland China and Singapore – as the Jaipur based Journal of Gem and Jewellery Industry reports – are bypassing the limitations imposed on trade through a triangulation involving Dubai and some Indian diamond processing units in Gujarat and Rajasthan. Actually the stagnating international demand for small sized natural diamond is seriously threatening jobs in the Indian industry. Reportedly an estimated 10% of small and medium diamond units or over 600 units in the diamond hubs of Varachha and Katargam grabbed this market opportunity to shift to manufacturing synthetic diamonds.
According to The Times of India, the smallest companies are now dependent entirely on Chinese man-made diamond rough, easier to cut, that allows operational manufacturing margins as low as Rs 10 (US$ 0.14) per carat, compared to Rs 50 (US$ 0.7) per carat paid for natural diamonds. Commentators assume that the soaring Indian lab-Grown production of 4.2 million carats in 2018 might have produced export amounting to US$ 43 million. While this is sustaining occupation in a critical period, the increasing quantities of small sized cut synthetic diamonds are also arising worries in the market. GJEPC, the Indian Gem and Jewellery Export Promotion Council, already investigated in 2013 on possible mixing lab grown and natural diamonds while the Bharat Diamond Bourse (BDB), one of the world’s largest exchanges, decided in September 2015 to act against traders and manufacturers dealing with lab-grown diamonds.
Gem News published on IGR – Italian Gemological Review #7, Summer 2019
