{"id":868079,"date":"2026-07-30T11:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T09:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=868079"},"modified":"2026-07-30T10:11:36","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T08:11:36","slug":"pain-for-iconic-138-year-old-south-african-company","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business\/868079\/pain-for-iconic-138-year-old-south-african-company\/","title":{"rendered":"Pain for iconic 138-year-old South African company"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

De Beers has seen its earnings from diamonds in South Africa drop by roughly R83 million, despite increasing production in the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The company was founded in 1888, beginning operations in Kimberley and the Vaal as diamonds were being discovered in South Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Under De Beers, the Kimberley diamond mine became the richest mine in the world, holding the title for nearly a century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The company has since expanded across the globe, but has kept many of its mining operations in South Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Recently, the company has come under pressure as global diamond prices drop due to decreased demand for the luxury item.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2025, the company’s Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Deductions, and Amortisations (EBITDA) was nearly R800 million in the negative.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These losses rose by approximately R83 million in 2026, despite the company increasing production from its South African mines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

De Beers produced roughly 1 million carats of raw diamonds in South Africa in 2025, and increased this to nearly 1.5 million carats in 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite this massive increase in production, the value of diamonds dropped from approximately R1,250 per carat to R1,083 over the course of a year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The company is also facing a backlog of raw diamonds awaiting processing due to a lack of demand in global markets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The lack of demand comes as the cost of living continues to rise in many countries, reducing spending on luxury items.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pressure is also being placed on De Beers by synthetic diamonds, which are lab grown and atomically identical to their mined counterparts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These synthetic alternatives are sold at a fraction of the price of mined diamonds, further reducing the demand for them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Anglo American, the parent company of De Beers, said there is a particular lack of demand for smaller and lower-quality diamonds, while demand for high-quality diamonds has been resilient.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“While demand for larger, higher-quality natural diamonds remained resilient, smaller and lower-quality diamonds continued to face pricing pressure from the impact of synthetic lab-grown diamonds,” it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The impact on South Africa<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

As global demand for diamonds falls, De Beers has been forced to alter its mining operations in South Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This includes a temporary production pause at the Venetia mine in Limpopo, one of South Africa’s largest diamond mines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Venetia mine accounts for approximately 40% of all raw diamonds produced in the country, and employs roughly 4,400 workers and contractors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

De Beers decided to pause production at the mine for two years, while it works through its current backlog of raw diamonds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The backlog has emerged as the diamond industry tries to prevent an oversupply of diamonds entering the market, which would reduce the luxury item’s scarcity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The value of diamonds is closely linked to the scarcity of the resource, meaning companies such as De Beers are working to ensure there is no oversupply.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is alarming for Limpopo’s mining industry, as the livelihoods of Venetia mine workers and contractors have come under pressure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A two-year pause could be dire for many households that rely on the mine for employment, as well as the surrounding communities that rely on this income to drive their economies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

De Beers said it is currently working to increase its revenue by revitalising consumer demand for natural diamonds through targeted advertising.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It said the high-end demand for larger diamonds will largely offset the lack of sales of its lower-value products globally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It said synthetic alternatives could continue to pose a problem for the natural diamond industry, as the price of these alternatives continues to fall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Retail prices for synthetic lab-grown diamonds continue to fall, and competition is expected to put further pressure on margins over time,” it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The group said it expects the rough diamond industry to remain challenging, particularly in low-value categories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of South Africa’s oldest mining companies has seen growing pressure in the diamond industry, despite increased production.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":131,"featured_media":841174,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"posted","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"2082753322683891867","_sma_x_attempts":1,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872],"tags":[14099,11071,21935,18829,25984],"class_list":["post-868079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-de-beers","tag-diamonds","tag-kimberley","tag-limpopo","tag-venetia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/868079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/131"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=868079"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/868079\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":868118,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/868079\/revisions\/868118"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/841174"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=868079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=868079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=868079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}