Polishing centres to receive less rough diamonds

TEL AVIV, Feb 12 (Reuters) - Major diamond polishing centres will see less supply of rough diamonds in coming years due to efforts by southern African nations to build their own polishing activities, DTC Managing Director Varda Shine said on Tuesday.

"There will be centres that will see less goods in the future," Shine told a diamond conference in Tel Aviv.

This so-called "beneficiation" process is a move by southern African countries to benefit from mining as well polishing activities.

This is done by encouraging manufacturers from the major world centres to set up polishing plants in southerm Africa, including Botswana and Namibia, transfering technology and skills to these countries and enabling them to reap the full polished price of the diamond.

Shine said smaller rough supply is inevitable since the intention is to divert $1.2 billion of rough diamonds for polishing in southern Africa by 2010.

"This will impact the amount of rough sent to the United States, Belgium and Israel," she said.

However, she added, the impact of this will be mitigated by the fact that actually it will be U.S., Israeli and Belgian manufacturers who will be polishing the rough dimaonds in southern Africa.

DTC, the marketing arm of De Beers, the world's top diamond producer, has set uup joint ventures in Botswana and Namibia to distribute the rough to be produced locally. De Beers is 45 percent owned by Anglo American Plc (AAL.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz).

Shine said these new companies will be "a template for how the DTC will work with new producers in the future".