‘By the grace of God’: Miners dig on in face of lab-grown diamonds

In 2003, a United Nations-backed international diamond certification scheme, the Kimberley Process,, external was launched in order to prevent conflict stones from entering the mainstream diamond market. But the industry has struggled to contain the reputational damage.

“To me the diamonds have failed us,” says Abubakar Amara, a primary school teacher in Kono. “What have those diamonds done for our community, for Kono, for Sierra Leone? We are considered as poor in the world.”

The British multinational, De Beers, which specialises in the mining and marketing of diamonds, is eager to change the narrative. In Sierra Leone, it’s launched a project called Gemfair,, external where local artisanal miners are offered equipment, training, and more transparent pricing for their finds. You might call it a kind of fairtrade scheme for diamonds.

“The idea is to connect with markets so that they can be able to find a place to sell their diamonds, and also to empower them, give them training, we give them skills,” says Raymond Alpha, Gemfair’s local representative.

But for De Beers, perhaps its most important function is reputational, allowing retailers to tell the origin story of every diamond they sell.

“We are seeing a growing interest from consumers,” says David Johnson, a De Beers representative. “With people increasingly wanting to know where their coffee, cotton or chocolate has come from, it’s not surprising that people also want to know where their diamond – one of the most emotionally significant purchases – has come from.”

While this increased traceability could win mined diamonds more customers, others say that the lab-grown alternatives are only going to continue to grow in popularity.

Rohit Mehta, chief executive of Forlink Ventures, a commodities house based in India’s lab-grown diamond capital, Surat, says these diamonds are not just cheaper, but also more ethical and better for the environment.

“People are more conscious about climate change, about extracting too much from the earth,” he says.

But the argument that lab-grown diamonds are “green” doesn’t sit well with everyone. Unlike natural diamonds, the lab-grown variety are hugely energy-intensive, requiring vast amounts of electricity to produce a single rough carat.

“These reactors run at the temperature of the sun,” says Stanley Mathuram, a US-based environmental consultant who’s studied the growth of the lab-grown diamond industry. “They’re like data centres. That’s the kind of energy that they require.”