Botswana and De Beers in June final yr agreed a brand new ten-year diamond gross sales deal, which is able to see ODC’s share of Debswana output rise to 30% earlier than gaining regularly to 50% by the tip of the brand new contract, because the nation seeks to get extra revenues from its assets.
Within the first half of the yr, Debswana offered diamonds price $1.29 billion in comparison with $2.54 billion registered in the identical interval final yr, Financial institution of Botswana information confirmed. In native forex phrases, the Debswana gross sales fell 47.3% to 17.555 billion pula.
Anglo, which plans to divest from De Beers as a part of an organisational shake up, lower diamond manufacturing by 19% throughout the first six months of the yr. It reported final week that output steering at De Beers was revised right down to 23-26 million carats from 26-29 million in response to the diamond market’s ongoing downturn.
Botswana will get 30%-40% of its income, 75% of its international alternate earnings and a 3rd of nationwide output from diamonds.
($1 = 13.5685 pulas)
(Reporting by Brian Benza, Enhancing by Bhargav Acharya and Miral Fahmy)