Transparency equals bankability, World Diamond Congress hears – by Martin Creamer (Mining Weekly.com – May 19, 2016)

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JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – The large number of bad-debt bankruptcies in the diamond industry in recent years was aired on the second day of the 37th World Diamond Congress in Dubai, where much emphasis was again placed on the critical need for financial transparency.

De Beers commercial development head Howard Davies drew attention to the difficulty of banks to view the diamond business as low-risk. “Transactions must all be real with real clients and real invoices. Sustainability multiplied by transparency equals bankability,” Davies told the congress, while also drawing attention to diamond portability facilitating rapid cross-border transactions.

Signet Jewellers VP David Bouffard said his company was committed to the responsible sourcing of diamonds and insisted on knowing where its diamonds were coming from and “who touches them along the way”.

The company had succeeded in mapping 99% of its gold supply and believed it could do the same with the $1-billion worth of polished diamonds it bought each year.

Panama’s former Deputy Finance Minister and current Panama Diamond Exchange president Mahesh Khemlani spoke about his country’s efforts to create transparency by passing anti-money laundering legislation and pointed out that the vast majority of the companies mentioned in the recent ‘Panama Papers’ were not Panamanian.

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