For many decades, the gold mining industry of the Soviet Union remained one of the largest in the world holding the well-balanced second place after South Africa in terms of gold output. From 1991, the industry started to decay, when instead of ten large territorial enterprises of Russia there emerged over 600 subsoil using companies mining from their first tens of kilos to 1.5-2.0 tons of metal per year. Naturally, such businesses could neither maintain geological exploration nor gold mining in the country.
Strategically located to the western coast of Southern Africa, Angola is the third largest and one of the most mineral potentially endowed and blessed country in sub-Saharan Africa. Angola said 8.6 million carats were mined by the formal sector in 2007. Endiama (Empresa de Diamantes de Angola) is the national diamond company of Angola founded in 1981 and it is the exclusive concessionary of mining rights in the domain of diamonds. Our agency had a possibility to address a couple of questions to the Head of Department of Strategical Planning and Investments, Tiago Dias.
Avi Paz, President of the Israel Diamond Exchange, was born in 1946 into a family of Belgian diamantaires. In 1971, he started trading in diamonds and became a member of the Israel Diamond Exchange. He is also the owner and general manager of Paz Avi Fancy Ltd, a diamond processing enterprise established in 1977, which was the first company in Israel to produce fancy cut diamonds. Avi Paz turned to be President of the Exchange in 2005. Recently he was elected for the second term. During the recent World Diamond Congress in Shanghai, Avi Paz was elected new President of the World Federation of Diamond Bourses.
The creation of the Namibian Diamond Trading Company (NDTC) is based on a 50x50 partnership between the Government of the Republic of Namibia and De Beers. The agreement, which resulted in the creation of the company, was signed in January 2007 and holds immense possibilities for the country in terms of the economic activity such a venture, is expected to generate. The purpose of the NDTC is to make diamonds available for sale in Namibia for local manufacturing. Shihaleni Ellis Ndjaba is the CEO of Namibian Diamond Trading Company (NDTC). Until January 2008 he was the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Works, Transport and Communication.
The Democratic Republic of the Congo’s state diamond miner, Societe Miniere de Bakwanga (MIBA), sold more than $8.2 million in its first public sale in five years, Reuters reported.
The auction, which took place April 28, saw 12 lots of a total 348,000 carats sold to five buyers. The average price achieved was $23.56 per carat.
MIBA previously sold 88 percent of its production to Emaxon Finance International Inc., a subsidiary of Israeli DGI Group. MIBA's commercial director Placide Ndumbi said the company planned to make up to 400,000 carats available in another sale at the end of June.
Ndumbi told Reuters that MIBA had ramped up production to around 100,000 to 150,000 carats a month.
MIBA is 20 percent owned by Africa-focused miner Mwana Africa Plc.
Rough&Polished
Register
Sign in